Making more of social media in European collaborative projects related to lifelong learning Author: Sally Reynolds, ATiT, Belgium

1. Improving Internet strategies and maximizing the social media presence of LLP
projects
This project was financed with the support of the European Commission. This publication is the sole responsibility of the
author and the Commission is not responsible for any use that may be made of the information contained therein. http://www.web2llp.eu
Forget the numbers – what about
the impact!
making more of social media in European collaborative projects related
to lifelong learning
Sally Reynolds, ATiT, Belgium

2. • About the project
• Usage of Social Media and
Internet in Lifelong Learning
Projects
• Good practice from existing
projects
• Project service offer
• Issues and Recommendations

3. 2 year KA2 Lifelong Learning Project
- 2012-2013
Partnership:
•University Luxembourg
•Web2Learn, Greece
•P.A.U Education
•Coventry University Enterprises, UK
•Pixel, Italy
•ATiT, Belgium

4. User Need analysis:
•Initial research in 2010 - online
questionnaireaddressed to LLP
project teams
•Out of 289 LLP projects selected for
funding in 2010 - focused on a
random sample of 150.
Ju-Youn SONG University of Luxembourg &
Katerina ZOUROU Web2Learn, Greece

6. Categorisation
Conole & Alevizou (2010)
• Social networking sites; (i.e. Facebook, LinkedIn, Ning)
• Blogs
• Microblogging tools; (i.e. Twitter)
• Presentation repositories (i.e. Slideshare)
• Video sharing tools; (i.e. YouTube, Vimeo)
• Social bookmarking applications; (i.e. Diigo, del.ici.ous)
• Web 2.0 picture repositories (i.e. Picasa, Flickr)
• RSS feed (allowing users to receive messages on their
RSS aggregator, i.e. Google reader)

7. 139 out of 150 projects
Website

8. 47 projects out of 150
Facebook 43
LinkedIn 8
Ning 2
Social
Networking Sites

9. 23 projects with a Twitter
account

10. http://www.scoop.it/t/iwbs-language-teaching

11. https://www.facebook.com/aplanetproject

12. http://www.linkedin.com/groups?
gid=3960155&trk=vsrp_groups_res_name&trkInfo=VSRPsearchId
%3A16166931371210388490%2CVSRPtargetId%3A3960155%2CVSRPcmpt
%3Aprimary

13. https://twitter.com/languages_web2

14. http://www.rec-all.info/

15. Service ofer
Services:
15 Video Showcases
8 Video Tutorials
3 handbooks
helpdesk
http://www.web2llp.eu/home

16. Service ofer
Training:
5 Day Face-to-face
10 hour Pilot course (EN)
10 hour Course (IT)
•10 hour Course (FR)
•10 hour Course (EN)

17. Face-to-face course
• Week-long residential training course delivered
in Leuven 18 - 23 February 2013
• Included in the Grundtvig/Comenius Data base
of courses
• Promoted widely via appropriate channels in
2012/2013 including national agencies and
European channels like eLearningEuropa
17
Improving web strategies and maximising
the social media presence of LLP projects

18. Course Applicants
18
…..of which 28 were directly involved in LLP
projects.
Austria 3 Hungary 1 Portugal 4
Belgium 3 India 1 Romania 1
Cyprus 2 Ireland 1 Spain 5
Georgia 2 Italy 4 Sweden 1
Germany 4 Latvia 2 Turkey 2
Greece 3 Poland 1 UK 4

19. Course Participants
9 people received
funding - 8 eventually
took part from Italy,
Austria, Spain, Germany
and Latvia - 4 men and
4 women.
19
Trainees and some of the trainers who took
part

20. Course description
• General inputs on the value of social media for LLP
projects aimed at raising awareness
• Group work to develop a dissemination strategy
and action plan for a mock-up project using social
media
• Input from experienced practitioners to highlight
best practice
• Focus sessions on specific tools and types of tool
including the “big 3” of social media
• Opportunities to work on trainees’ own projects
and their use of social media
• Secret Facebook group
20

21. Course objectives and expectations
• Identification of the right SM tools that will yield the most
impact for dissemination
• Understanding, creating and implementing a web strategy at
the proposal stage
• Sharing the knowledge of SM training not just to parties
interested in their projects but their peers also
21

22. Evaluation approach
• Informal feedback and impressions gathered
during the course
• Formal evaluation at end of course
• Follow up evaluation 3 months later to assess
real impact
22

23. Formal evaluation
80% satisfaction level for the course
Areas for improvements to the course, certain content and delivery.
•More hands-on activity related to an actual project
•Other suggested training courses – to make the course virtual
•Good / Bad analysis of SM campaigns
•To have pre-reading material on the various subjects
•Advertise the course via the EACEA Infodays
•To adopt the availability of the course as part of the application / proposal
stage
23

24. Evaluation 3 months later
• I have developed web and social media strategies for two projects I am working with, I
have shared my new knowledge with my colleagues, I have started using several new
tools for the projects I implement
• I ran a first hand-on training with the staff ......we focussed on Twitter and LinkedIn,
discussed the pro and cons of the different ways to establish and manage accounts, put
people in charge of different tasks and are now gathering experience ….
• For our next projects to be planned I could raise the attention to plan SM from the
beginning - instead of just adding it at the end for dissemination only.
• I have used web and social media strategies, tools and materials learned in Web2LLP in
the courses I teach, both graduate or postgraduate and in research projects, both on
going and also in proposals
• Use of more media for promoting project includes renewal of FB page for company,
creation of events and promotion of projects and activities and utilisation of tools for
management of accounts (Hootsuite and Tweetdeck)
• The tools and services offered both during and after the course have been very helpful
and have left a significant mark on our work
• Thank you guys for being available to answer all our SM related questions! I really
appreciate having a team to help me out with my SM adventures.
24

25. 25

26. Online courses
• Pilot in English – 5 sessions of 2 hours
delivered weekly starting 30 April
• Course in Italian - 5 sessions of 1 hours
delivered weekly starting 4 June
• Course in French - 5 sessions of 1 hour
delivered weekly starting 4 Sept
• Course in English - 5 sessions of 1 hour
delivered weekly starting 6 Sept
26

27. Contents
• Setting up a web strategy and communication
action plan
• Selecting and choosing social media tools
• Managing and measuring social media
presence
• Sharing online content (and dealing with
copyright issues)
• Round-table session with experienced LLP
managers
27

28. Structure and support- webinar
28
Moderators
Domain experts
Invited LLP managers
Group or one-to-
one chatQuick
Feedback
Presentations,
polls, screen
sharing and
mind maps

29. Structure
web page
29
Recording for watching afterwards
Slides that were shown available
for download
Any preparation work beforehand
and description of session
Bios and photos of session leaders

30. Course Participation April –
June 2013
30

31. Courses Participation Sept – Oct
2013
31

32. Location – Participants April – June
32

33. Location – Participants Sep – Oct
33

34. Slideshare views
34

35. Views of recording
35

36. Evaluation
36

37. http://www.web2llp.eu/training/online

38. Issues and Recommendations
• Importance of a web strategy from the start –
recognise that Social Media goes beyond
‘importing’ dissemination methods and
messages into a new media, it’s a tool for
dialogue with NEW methods and new
messages.

39. Issues and Recommendations
• Importance of a web strategy
• Project identity vs. topic or area of expertise

40. Issues and Recommendations
• Importance of a web strategy
• Project identity vs topic or area of expertise
• Responsibility and ownership with the
project team

41. Issues and Recommendations
• Importance of a web strategy
• Project identity vs topic or area of expertise
• Responsibility and ownership
• Sustainability – own channels vs active
engagement in existing channels

42. Issues and Recommendations
• Importance of a web strategy
• Project identity vs topic or area of expertise
• Responsibility and ownership
• Sustainability – own channels vs active
engagement in existing channels
• Numbers and expectations – by partners, by
the EC

43. Issues and Recommendations
• Importance of a web strategy
• Project identity vs topic or area of expertise
• Responsibility and ownership
• Sustainability – own channels vs active
engagement in existing channels
• Numbers and expectations – by partners, by
the EC
• Dealing with limited resources

44. For more information
44
http://www.web2llp.eu
http://www.slideshare.net/Web2LLP
sally.reynolds@atit.be
Thank you!