Tufts has a new voice — and it speaks in 140-character chunks.
For the past two years, Tufts has been quietly developing a significant presence on Twitter, the micro-blogging website now frequented by a reported 190 million users monthly.
The official Tufts Twitter account (@TuftsUniversity) has amassed more than 5,000 followers, and practically every facet of the school's administration has launched its own account, from the Office of Alumni Relations to the Office of Undergraduate Admissions.
The value of Twitter to students is obvious; the Beelzebubs, for instance, use the forum to advertise audition times and show dates to its "followers."
Now, the university is tapping into Twitter's large user base as well, facilitating an unprecedented level of direct and informal electronic dialogue between Tufts students and staff. The site also provides a new medium through which to share university news with parents and alumni.
Georgiana Cohen, the Tufts employee who oversees the main Tufts account, said that the criterion for a post is simple and unscientific: It needs to be interesting.
"It could be something timely like an event. It could be photos from Matriculation or a video shot by a student at an a cappella concert," Cohen, the managing editor of web communications, said.
The language of the posts is often colloquial and punctuated by emoticons, in keeping with what Cohen calls the "conversational and accessible nature of the medium."
Twitter is, Cohen emphasizes, a forum for dialogue rather than a broadcast channel or a marketing tool. The account frequently features "retweets" of Tufts-related posts from other students as well as responses and comments.
"Often [it will be] something funny a student says, like a joke about hiking up the hill," Cohen said. "We want to highlight all of the aspects of the Tufts experience that thrive on Twitter. We want to build a community."
The ambitions of a Tufts Twitter account targeted at alumni are slightly different, according to Dave Nuscher, the director of editorial and creative services for Advancement Communications, and Enza Vescera, associate director of electronic and print marketing for Advancement Communications.
While the main university Twitter account publishes information of general interest and relevance to the Tufts community at large, the alumni Twitter feed targets a more specific audience: young alumni who fall within Twitter's primary user demographic.
Tailoring content for that group has proven challenging, Vescera said.
"We started off [in August 2009] posting press releases … and people didn't seem to be interested in that," she said.
In response, Vescera, Nuscher and their colleagues decided to try a lighter approach.
"We thought, ‘Let's have more fun with this,' so we broadened our focus to look at pop culture references to Tufts out there in the world [and] questions we could ask to engage people in a conversation," Vescera said.
Still, as an official platform of communication that reflects the university, the alumni account is run more formally than many Twitter accounts.
Content is premeditated rather than spontaneous, and tweaks are made before a tweet is posted.
Those in charge of the alumni Twitter account prioritize providing graduates with what Nuscher calls "bump[s] of pride" — news and facts relating to Tufts that strengthen the ties between graduates and their alma mater.
"When Tufts gets touted for being the best at ‘X' or the top of the list at ‘Y,' alums like to see that," Vescera said.
Because Twitter's user base is significantly smaller than Facebook's — which has a stronger alumni presence — the university's expansion into Twitter has been slow and evolving.
"Slow and steady wins the race," Nuscher said. "We're very attuned to recalibrating as we go, based on responses."
The Office of Alumni Relations is now planning on honing in on specific cities with significant alumni populations. It recently launched the first such account, @TuftsAlumBoston, which targets, the office estimated, more than 29,000 Boston-area grads, according to Samantha Snitow (LA '02), assistant director of alumni relations.
"A very large portion of our active Boston alumni are young alumni and … prevalent Twitter users," Snitow said. "We feel it's important to go where they are."
The area-specific Twitter accounts will share information about upcoming alumni events, Snitow said, as well as create a venue for alumni networking.
"Social media allow us to create an online community," Snitow said. "This then provides the opportunity to ask questions and comments and develop a more meaningful relationship between alumni, the university and the alumni association."
Though individual departments, offices and schools remain responsible for their own Twitter content — The Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy and the Cummings School of Veterinary Medicine, among others, have their own accounts — the Office of Web Communications has crafted a set of social media guidelines as a reference. Key principles include "authenticity, honesty and open dialogue."
Assistant Director of Admissions Daniel Grayson (LA `06), who posts content to the admissions office account (@TuftsAdmissions), has answered questions from prospective students via Twitter about topics like financial aid policy and the accuracy of college guides, breaking the traditional wall between the students who write college applications and the officials who read them.
But official Tufts Twitter accounts are not aimed solely at Jumbos past, present and future.
The Office of Public Relations (@TuftsPR) tweets links to press releases and articles featuring Tufts students and professors to 343 followers, as of yesterday, including members of the news media, according to Kim Thurler, the director of public relations for Tufts' Medford/Somerville campus.
"[We] need to communicate through channels that our key audiences are using, [and] social media are an increasing part of that mix," Thurler said. "If they're using Twitter or other social media, Tufts needs to be there."
Twitter is not the only social media tool Tufts is utilizing, though, nor is it the final online frontier.
The university updates a general Facebook fan page as well as a page managed by the admissions office and intended for prospective students. And university communications officials are keeping their eyes open for emerging sites.
"Things in social media can change very quickly. Things crop up all the time," Vescera, who is looking into the location-tracking website Foursquare, said. "We're certainly not only relying on the existing, currently popular sites."
Cohen explained that the importance of Twitter lies in its present popularity.
"I think that Tufts will continue to explore social media as long as it is relevant," Cohen said. "And right now, it is highly relevant."
