2011 Quinnipiac University Interactive Communications ICM522de: Social Media Jan Bush
[MOTIVATING CHANGE THROUGH SOCIAL MEDIA: THE INFLUENCERS]
If you are not ousting an evil dictator, how do you move people to collectively support social change? It’s much harder to motivate the masses for “the common good.” It’s even harder when the organization does not control the outcome desired. In this chapter we will discover how organizations for education reform in the United States used social media to affect change through influence.
Motivating Change through Social Media: The Influencers
Chapter 1: The Influencers Introduction For the past decade, the U.S. school system operated on the Congressional 2001 No Child Left Behind Act to ensure that 100 percent of U.S. students are proficient in reading and math by 2014. Under this act, federal funding for schools depended on district-wide results from standardized tests developed by their individual states. School administrators and teachers had to demonstrate “adequate yearly progress” to ensure funding. Stories abound about states lowering their standards and school districts gaming the system. In a 2007 article posted on Education Sector blog site, Kevin Carey noted that “…the Alabama Department of Education has lowered standards annually, to the point where even abjectly failing districts like Birmingham make the grade” (Carey, 2007). The most notorious case of cheating the system occurred in Atlanta, GA. According to the Atlanta Journal Constitution, “Across Atlanta Public Schools, staff worked feverishly in secret to transform testing failures into successes” (Vogel, H, 2011). Other areas of contention included curriculum changes that practically eliminated other subjects like creative arts and physical education, English only assessments for testing, and increased minority segregation in school districts. Meanwhile, the U.S. educational standing in the world stagnates at average (OECD, 2010). On September 23rd, 2011, in an executive action, President Obama announced a voluntary plan for “states to be released from certain requirements” of the No Child Left Behind Act (Bringing Flexibility & Focus to Education Law, 2011). Provisions include greater student engagement, well-rounded curriculum, fair and responsible evaluations, student needs, career and college development, tailored solutions, and rewards for success. Although a divided Congress had yet to authorize the education act as required by law, under the voluntary plan the U.S. Department of Education began collaborating with educators around the country on significant reforms to raise the quality of education for U.S. students to achieve in the 21st Century. The President was convinced; education reform had begun.
ICM522de Bush Chapter 1: The Influencers
Page 1
Motivating Change through Social Media: The Influencers How did they get there? In a Harvard Business School Working Paper, Alnoor Ebrahim and Kasturi Rangan address the limitations of non-profit’s ability to measure social performance. Their model suggests that “…social sector organizations can increase their control over long-term impacts in at least two ways: by expanding their operations in order to reach a threshold population or critical mass (scale), and by offering more comprehensive services or partnering with others in order to tackle a problem (scope).” Under conditions of complexity, Ebrahim and Rangan “…expect that it will be especially difficult for organizations to achieve impacts single-handedly” (Ebrahim & Rangan, 2010). Organizations seeking education reform bound themselves together, however loosely, to change educational policy by the only means they could – through influence. Influencing public policy is complicated. It requires multiple roles, multiple interventions with stakeholders, mass communications, understandable messages, believable goals, reliable information sources, public access to information, and long-term commitment from all levels of stakeholders -- to name a few of the complexities. By aligning their missions, their combined efforts had greater impact through increased scale and scope confirming Ebrahim’s and Rangan’s findings. In the introduction of the book Cyberactivism, editors Martha McCaugher and Michael Ayres address academic theories that explain successful social movements. In it they state that “…social action occurs because of political opportunities…strong collective identities within…and because a social movement group has the ability to ‘frame’ its cause successfully” (McCaughery & Ayres, 2003). Education reform had all three. Public education has suffered. In less than 100 years, public schools went from an agricultural base, to industrial focus and most recently, in to cyberspace and interactive communications on a global scale. The transition has been rocky at best and mostly lacking. Students today are connected with their Facebook pages, video uploads, and real time tweeting and texting away from the classroom. By the time the kindergarten class of 2011 reaches middle school, over half -- or probably all of them -- will be accessing the internet solely through smart phones. Desktop computers will be relegated to high-performance machines for professional researchers and digital artists. Our mobile society will be even more mobile by then. The “political opportunity” for change existed because of technology and the student use of it. Professional educators operate from a strong collective identity. They all work toward a common goal -- educating our youth. Many have regular contact with coworkers and district peers. Continuing education credits are required which, once again, places educators together either in classes, online, or at regional and national conferences. Students also know and spend personal time with teachers and administrators. Parents have emotional ties to teachers, trusting them with ICM522de Bush Chapter 1: The Influencers
Page 2
Motivating Change through Social Media: The Influencers their children. These personal interactions and personal knowledge of others in their “collective community” reinforced their loyalty to education reform. This personal touch also made it easy to expand their reach to other districts and nonprofits while reinforcing their connections online through social media. Most professional educators are communicators of the nth degree. They speak in front of groups of students, parents, and community leaders on a regular basis. They provide one-on-one counsel to students. Educators write, edit, and expand documents for others to understand. They are fluent in training others. Educators are technologically savvy to keep up with their student populace. They have the ability to “frame” their messages so others, having no prior knowledge of the subject matter, can understand. Professional educators, parents, and community leaders are committed to social activism with their goal of school reform (Brokaw, 2011). Their circles of trust were deeply rooted. Social media networking was a natural expansion for this tech savvy, highly-educated, and emotionally committed group. In 2007 when Congress was to have reauthorized the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) act with reforms; it appears education reform groups also increased their “cyberactivism” presence. Their efforts now reached more people in less time using these new tools social media provided. Most of their efforts rested in what Jeroen Van Laer and Peter Van Aelst described in Cyber-protest and civil society: the Internet and action repertoires in social movements as “low threshold” tactical efforts that entail less risk and lower personal commitments of their “activists” (Van Laer & Van Aelst, 2009). Organizations adapted their onsite training for legislative advocacy to online access – opening it up to all educators. Online discussions allowed access for members to participate in live national conversations. Transcripts were posted online. Policy books reached a much larger audience online. In addition to websites, most education organizations have, at a minimum, Facebook and Twitter accounts. They also blog. Some support YouTube and Flickr with original content. The largest of the teachers union, the National Education Association has multiple, issue-oriented accounts on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and Flickr. Internet newsletters resonate with topics of concern for educators with reform at the forefront. The inaugural issue of ASCD’s “educator advocate” electronic newsletter, The Capitol Connection, came out on August 15, 2011. It provides information on federal policy issues for educators to talk to their lawmakers including numerous articles relating to NCLB act and education reform.
ICM522de Bush Chapter 1: The Influencers
Page 3
Motivating Change through Social Media: The Influencers Podcasts address everything on education reform from Americans for the Arts’ The Role of the Arts in Education April 2011 podcast to Education Sectors’ podcast for higher education reform. All are downloadable to the public for free from iTunes. Paul de Armond contends in his paper Netwar in the Emerald City: WTO (World Trade Organization) protest strategy and tactics that “…centralized control of operations— including by locating some command, media, and other functions in the same building” make them “vulnerable to counter leadership targeting.” (de Armond, 2001) This theme that a leaderless, or no one leader in charge, is best was repeated throughout my research. One leader did not define education reform. Many organizations supplied multiple leaders with in this movement. Another theory that threaded through my research was the “diversifying the discourse of struggle” (Garrido & Halavais, 2003) as exemplified with in the Zapatista de Liberación Nacional movement that originated in 1994. Their struggle started in Chiapas, Mexico, focusing on the rights of indigenous people. Quickly the movement became a “call for justice and economic opportunity for all those underrepresented and exploited groups around the globe.” (Garrido & Halavais, 2003) This world-wide movement was made possible through social networking. The U.S. education reformers consistently pushed the underlying theme of change as a community. Their diversified “discourse of struggle” was how to make that change – all groups adhered to their own missions and objectives. Now that reform has begun; so will the discussions. It will be interesting to watch the transformation of the social media message topics by these highly educated, technologically savvy, professional educators. Will the main messages move from “why” as the dominator to “how?” Will there be more discussions directed between the various groups to try and achieve some common ground for change? One thing I am sure of, discussions that used to be around the water cooler, in hallways, boardrooms and often behind closed doors -- will now occur through social networking to a much broader audience.
ICM522de Bush Chapter 1: The Influencers
Page 4
Motivating Change through Social Media: The Influencers The actors This list represents a sampling of the social media activities I studied. Active organizations numbered in the thousands when you count school districts. ASCD Founded in 1943 as a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization, ASCD is an “educational leadership organization dedicated to advancing best practices and policies for the success of each learner.” They serve over 160,000 members in 148 countries. Their membership consists mostly of professional educators. The Center for Education Reform The Center for Education Reform targets parents, policymakers, and the media to improve educational opportunities for children. They launched a new website on September 27, 2011. Education Commission of the States Opening its nonprofit headquarters in 1967, the Education Commission of the States serves every state of the union (except Washington) plus the District of Columbia and three U.S. territories providing resources for “state policymakers to develop effective policy and practice in education.” As part of it, the National Center for Learning and Leadership supports service learning projects for students. Education Sector Nonprofit, nonpartisan think tank, Education Sector, “challenges conventional thinking in education policy.” It launched in 2006. Their focus recently expanded from K-12 to include higher education. Education Sector borrows from public policy, research, and journalism, “…marrying the independence, communications excellence, and public accessibility of the best journalism; a commitment to research; and the practical impact of policy analysis.” Standout: Student Voices in Schools SoundOut offers “expert assistance programs focused on promoting Student Voice and Meaningful Student Involvement throughout education.” This organization offers tool kits on student activism for students and teachers. The Free Child Project The mission of The Freechild Project is “to advocate, inform, and celebrate social change led by and with young people around the world” promoting youth and adult partnerships. This organization supplies kits and tools for youth to be leaders. The United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization UNESCO initiated the Young Masters Programme Foundation in 1999 as a global web-based distance education on sustainable development, aimed at high school students and their teachers. This is part of their Education for Sustainable Development efforts throughout the world including schools in the United States.
ICM522de Bush Chapter 1: The Influencers
Page 5
Motivating Change through Social Media: The Influencers Conclusion Motivating change through social media worked for education reform in the United States by influencing enough policy makers that the President of the United States issued an executive order to officially begin reform. Although risks were low and organizations followed legal paths to promote reform, their large numbers reached across America to all educational groups and stakeholders. The combined resources of these involved organizations focusing on education reform increased their impact by reaching the same people multiple times. These professional communicators provided succinct messages that were easily understood and every group communicated in their own way to their own memberships, constituents, and policymakers. Their messages were broad so that others interested in education reform could belong. They used social media tools that their targets used. There was no one leader; there were many. Even the U.S. Secretary of Education, Arme Duncan, played a supporting role. The strategies and tactics that worked here have worked before and they will work again helping more social changes come about.
Helpful Sites Academia.edu: http://www.academia.edu/ Research papers by academics around the world International Journal of Communications: http://ijoc.org/ojs/index.php/ijoc Online, multimedia, peer reviewed journals focusing on communications Pew Research Center: http://pewresearch.org/ Great site for data mining Rand Corporation: http://www.rand.org/pubs/research_briefs.html Summaries on peer reviewed research topics primarily on policy Social Science Research Network: http://www.ssrn.com/ Network of academic papers and conference presentations from around the world; many costs to download. I found the working paper from Harvard Business School here. I read the abstract, then searched for it online and found it on another site.
Vocabulary Actors: key groups or individuals who use social media to help or hinder a cause Cyberactivism: also known as internet activism, offers social activists internet channels for communication such as email, websites, blogs, podcasts, etc. Meatings: in-person meetings (McCaughery & Ayres, 2003) Meat bodies: also known as wetware, stands for people (McCaughery & Ayres, 2003) RL: real life ICM522de Bush Chapter 1: The Influencers
Page 6
Motivating Change through Social Media: The Influencers Links Introduction No Child Left Behind Act: http://find.ed.gov/search?client=default_frontend&output=xml_no_dtd&proxystylesheet =default_frontend&q=no+child+left+behind&sa.x=0&sa.y=0 Education Sector: http://www.educationsector.org/ The Atlanta Journal-Constitution: http://www.ajc.com/news/investigation-into-apscheating-1001375.html How did they get there? Harvard Business School: http://www.hbs.edu/ Working Paper: http://www.hbs.edu/research/pdf/10-099.pdf Cyberactivism: Online Activism in Theory and Practice (book): http://www.amazon.com/Cyberactivism-Online-Activism-TheoryPractice/dp/0415943205 Cyberactivsim: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_activism National Education Association: http://www.nea.org/home/39653.htm#facebook Cyber-protest and civil society: the Internet and action repertoires in social movements: http://www.m2p.be/publications/1260489691.pdf Online Discussions: http://www.educationsector.org/events/online-discussion-growthmodels-closer-look Policy books: http://www.ascdpolicypriorities.org/ascdpolicypriorities/0711#pg1 YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0TQyOwJ7xPI&feature=channel_video_title Blog: http://commonaction.blogspot.com/ Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/priorityschools Twitter: http://twitter.com/#!/priorityschools YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/user/NEAPrioritySchools Flickr: http://www.flickr.com/groups/neatoday/ The Center for Education Reform: http://edreform.com/ Americans for the Arts: http://blog.artsusa.org/ The Role of the Arts in Education: http://itunes.apple.com/podcast/artsblog/id254497504 Education Sectors’ Podcasts: http://www.quickanded.com/category/podcasts/page/3 The Actors Netwar in the Emerald City: WTO (World Trade Organization) protest strategy and tactics: http://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/monograph_reports/MR1382/MR1382.ch7. pdf ASCD: http://www.ascd.org/Default.aspx Education Sector: http://www.educationsector.org/ The Education Commission of the States: http://www.ecs.org/ The National Center for Learning and Leadership (NCLC) http://www.ecs.org/ecsmain.asp?page=/html/educationIssues/ProgressofReform.asp The Free Child Project: http://www.freechild.org/index.htm UNESCO: http://www.unesco.org/new/en/education/themes/leading-the-internationalagenda/education-for-sustainable-development/ The Young Masters Programme Foundation: http://ympfoundation.org/ Standout: http://www.soundout.org/index.html
ICM522de Bush Chapter 1: The Influencers
Page 7
Motivating Change through Social Media: The Influencers Bibliography Bringing Flexibility & Focus to Education Law. (2011, 9 23). Retrieved from U.S. Department of Education: http://www.ed.gov/sites/default/files/lookingback-moving-forward.pdf Brokaw, T. (2011, 9 26). The State of the Education Nation. Retrieved from NBC News Education Nation: http://www.educationnation.com/index.cfm?objectid=D6E04E50-E4B6-11E0A435000C296BA163 Carey, K. (2007, 11 12). The Pangloss Index: How States Game the No Child Left Behind Act. Retrieved from Education Sector.org: http://www.educationsector.org/publications/pangloss-index-how-statesgame-no-child-left-behind-act de Armond, P. (2001). NETWAR in the Emerald City: WTO Protest Strategy and Tactics. Retrieved from Rand Corporation: http://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/monograph_reports/MR1382/M R1382.ch7.pdf Ebrahim, A., & Rangan, V. (2010). The Limits of Nonprofit Impact: A Contingency Framework for measuring social performance. Retrieved from Havard Business School: http://www.hbs.edu/research/pdf/10-099.pdf Garrido, M., & Halavais, A. (2003). Mapping Networks of Support for the Zapatista Movement. In M. M. Ayers, Cyberactivism: Online Activism in Theory and Practice (pp. 165-184). New York: Routledge. Hefling, K. (2011, 9 23). Obama making big changes to Bush-era education law. Retrieved from MSNBC: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/44640812?ocid=ansmsnbc11 Iskander, E. (2011). Connecting the National and the Virtual: Can Facebook Activism Remain Relevant After Egypt's January 25 Uprising? Retrieved from International Journal of Communications 5 (2011): http://ijoc.org/ojs/index.php/ijoc/article/view/1165/598 Lawrence, D. (2011, 7 6). A digital Crisis is Coming your way. Are you ready? Retrieved from Forbes.com: http://www.forbes.com/sites/forbesleadershipforum/2011/07/06/a-digitalcrisis-is-coming-your-way-are-you-ready/ Lecinski, J. (2011). Zero Moment of Truth. Retrieved from Seromomentoftruth.com: http://www.zeromomentoftruth.com/google-zmot.pdf Maiers, A. (2011, 9 2). How I am using social media to change the world, and you can too! Retrieved from Social Media Explorer: http://www.socialmediaexplorer.com/social-media-marketing/change-theworld/ Mainwaring, S. (2011, 3 1). Tell to Win: Purposeful storytelling for social media success. Retrieved from The We First blog: http://simonmainwaring.com/brands/tell-to-win-purposeful-storytelling-forsocial-mediasuccess/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed %3A+SimonMainwaring+%28Simon+Mainwaring+Blog%29
ICM522de Bush Chapter 1: The Influencers
Page 8
Motivating Change through Social Media: The Influencers McCaughery, M., & Ayres, M. (2003). Cyberactivism: Online Activism in Theory and Practice. New York: Routledge. OECD. (2010). PISA 2009 Results: Executive Summary. Retrieved from OECD.org: http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/34/60/46619703.pdf Shih, C. (2011, 9 21). The Social Enterprise is Here. Retrieved from Frobes.com: http://www.forbes.com/sites/ciocentral/2011/09/21/the-social-enterprise-ishere/ Temin, D. (2011, 8 4). The 10 "Don'ts" of Corporate Social Media. Retrieved from Forbes.com: http://www.forbes.com/sites/daviatemin/2011/08/04/the-10donts-of-corporate-social-media/ Van Laer, J., & Van Aelst, P. (2009). Chapter 12 Cyber-protest and civil society: the Internet and action repertoires in social movements. Retrieved from Media, Movements & Politics University of Antwerp: http://www.m2p.be/publications/1260489691.pdf Vogel, H. (2011, 7 6). Investigaton into APS chating finds behavior across every level. Retrieved from The Atlanta Journal-Constitution: http://www.ajc.com/news/investigation-into-aps-cheating-1001375.html Wiki. (2011, 9 23). No Child Left Behind Act. Retrieved from Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No_Child_Left_Behind_Act Wroblewski, L. (2010, May 27). Mobile First. Retrieved July 15, 2011, from YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NjE_Or4VIlU&feature=player_embedded
Jan Bush 26 Sep 2011 30 Sep 2011 Revised Bibliography
ICM522de Bush Chapter 1: The Influencers
Page 9