How Social Media Can Ruin Your Career

So how can social media ruin your life? 
This week my class took to the internet to find professionals in our own fields of study that were fired because of something on social media.  Below is my presentation on two pilots that were fired due to pictures that a model posted of them on her twitter. 



Two pilots fired for letting bikini model into the cockpit of their airplane and telling her that she could control the plane during takeoff.
The two pilots, Fredrico Soaje and Patricio Zocchi let a 29-year-old model named Vicky Xipolatakis in the cockpit of the plane that they were about to fly.  Not only did Vicky post selfies with the pilots on twitter, but she also posted a video of the controls and of the pilots saying that she could control the plane during takeoff.  
No one is allowed inside the cockpit of a plane unless authorized by regulations of the Federal Aviation Administration, which is why this was an issue.  

After 9/11 the rules and regulations became more strict in hope of keeping people safe.  They also put at risk all of the people on that plane.  Both pilots have been fired from Austral airlines and are facing $10 million in lawsuits and 2-8 years in prison. Vicky is also facing charges.  Fredrico and Patricio let Vicky into the cockpit knowing that it was against the rules and regulations and because of her posts on social media, they had to pay a huge price.  

Connected Educator
There are so many ways to teach and learn by using the internet.  I can't imagine education WITHOUT it!  So what are some ways to connect with learners using the internet?  Well, there are blogs, bookmarking tools (find some examples in my earlier blog post), podcasts, social media, wikis, google docs (another earlier blog post), and more!  Chapter 5 of the Connected Educator by Sheryl Nussbaum-Beach and Lani Ritter Hall talks about these types of tools and how to utilize them!  

Blogs are a great way to share information about any topic that you want.  You can use them personally or professionally as well.  Basically, they're just public journals.  Some popular blog websites are Tumblr, Blogger (which you obviously know about), Weebly, and a popular one for educators is Edublog which helps schools and teacher provide a window into the classrooms.

Podcasts are audio recording that can be posted on the internet or downloaded to a smart phone, computer, iPod, or any other audio playing device.  Podomatic is a free site that lets record audio or video recordings.  If you're going to make a podcast you would just want to use the audio setting.  Musicians used to use podcasts as a way to let their fans know what they were up to when they were on the road, but it can also be used for educational purposes.  Julie DeNeen posted an article of 50 educational podcasts, and I'm sure there's a ton more.

Apps for Days!

All the Apps that You Could Ever Imagine!
Have you ever heard of Augmented Reality (AR)? Well it's a very cool, very real bit of magic that you can bring into any moment using just your SMART PHONE!  It basically makes a 4-D image pop up out of nowhere due to, explained by Drew Minock "overlaying computer generated images, or other data, on a real-life environment."  
My favorite app that we learned about was Zookazam! Which puts animals right in the palm of your hand, as you can see in the picture below.  A great article about Zookazam explains the great features of this app, including how teachers can use it in the classroom as a creative and intellectual tool.  My favorite idea from the article is having students create a habitat and placing the animal in it using the app.

Can't get over this app! @zookazam #gen2243 #zookazamapp pic.twitter.com/LCmpdAXw1s

— Cassandra Hage (@CJ_Hage) March 10, 2016

Archaeologists are even using this technology to see and smell the past.  With another AR app called Dead Mans Nose which emits odors as you pass certain locations.  This can help Archaeologists not only visit sites, but LIVE them as well, serving as a window into the past.

Google Cardboard!
Basically Google Cardboard is the coolest thing since sliced bread.  It is an app that can transport you anywhere! 

 All you have to do is have the cardboard box that goes with it, insert your phone, and you're transported anywhere around the world!  It reminds me of those cool picture changing toys we had as kids, but obviously more technologically advanced and more fun!

App Smackdown
Here are some other awesome apps that my classmates taught me about this week!

Adobe Sketch is a fun app, especially for all you artists out there! One cool thing about it is that you can put in a picture, trace it, and then make the picture go transparent so that you only see the trace.  Also, all of your drawings are backed up onto the cloud.

Where To Go? This app makes it easy to find any type of business or transportation while you are in an area that you aren't used to!  You can look for food, gas, hotels, clothing, groceries, and more.  The app also has a handy tip calculator to help you out when you go out to eat!

Color Therapy is a fun way to be creative with coloring templates!

Uber is an app that helps you find a ride.  The drivers for Uber are all background checked and have their cars nice and clean, from my own experiences.  It's not to expensive and is an easy way to get from point A to point B.

Astronauts and Presentations.

Astronaut Abby!
Abigail Harrison is a young woman with a big dream, to be the first astronaut on Mars.  Abby's dream grew into so much more when she started using social media to reach out to people and learn more about what she wanted to do.  The growth of her social media accounts have given her the opportunity to not only run her own programs, like Mars Generation which is a non-profit preparing the students of today to become the leaders of tomorrow, but she was also selected to be the Earth liaison to Italian Astronaut, Luca Parmitano, while he was up in the space station.  One tip that she gave my class was not to over expose yourself and to only focus on the social media accounts that help you the most, which for her were Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook.  Good luck to Abby! I can't wait to hear about her adventures!

In Other Space Related News..
Scott Kelly has returned from a year on the International Space Station!  His recent return was documented on Snapchat for everyone to see! Here are some pictures capturing the exciting day!

Okay, Now Let's Stop Spacing Out and Look at Some Presentation Tools!
In the semester where I have been doing the least amount of presentation, and my last semester of college, I finally learn about all of these presentation tools that are so much better than just standing in front of a PowerPoint presentation.  A presentation is supposed to be more than just reading off slides.  In fact, the slides are mostly there for "decoration" and shouldn't be the entire presentation.  There are some tools that allow you to create a more interesting backdrop for your presentation.  Some examples include Animoto, Emaze, Office Mix, Haiku Deck, Powtoon, and more!  The two that I have found easy to navigate and fun to use are Animoto and Emaze.

Animoto is more of a video presentation.  It offers you templates and then you place in the pictures and text.  After picking a song you can add in as many pictures and text boxes as it takes to finish the song.  The one thing I liked about this tool was that it only let you add a certain amount of text to each slide, limiting you so that there isn't too much.  Here's a video that I made on Animoto.com promoting my major here at Stockton University.




Emaze is also run by templates that you can choose from.  All you have to do is add the pictures and writing and you're good to go.  It is very interesting because a lot of the templates are 3-D, making the presentation more creative.  It is also similar to a video with the ability to add notes, voice, and set timing.  Here's a basic Emaze presentation that I made about what I'm doing for Spring break.  





Here's Some Article's About More Presentation Tools..
Microsoft Sway - if you're presenting over the computer, then Sway is perfect for you!  With the cloud being utilized, Sway presentations can be viewed anywhere without formatting problems and also embedded onto websites and blogs.  The editing is also based on a story line, making the editing easy for everyone.

GoAnimate - Similar to Animoto, GoAnimate is a video presentation that comes with backgrounds, templates, characters, and even languages and accents for the characters.  This is a great tool for teachers to use because if your class is registered then students presentations cannot be viewed by the public.


Office Mix - This is a free expansion for anyone who already owns PowerPoint on their computer.  You can even take PowerPoint presentations that you have already made and upload them to Office Mix to upgrade it!  With this expansion you can add video and voice to the presentation, draw and mark up the slides during the presentation, and you can also embed your presentations.  This tool is keeping PowerPoint alive in the midst of all of these fascinating new tools.

TED Talks and Twitter

#Scistuchat
This week my class had a webinar guest, Adam Taylor, a high school science teacher who started #scistuchat, a was for students, teachers, and scientists from around the world to connect on twitter.   Adam has connected with around 400-500 scientists from around 150 countries around the globe to participate in a monthly discussion about different topics having to do with science.  They use moderators to keep the conversation steady and educational and have made some memorable connections, including the US Department of Energy.  


Adam has made his connections through twitter by first finding out that certain scientists were on twitter and then contacting them.  From there, his PLN grew into the thousands.  He categorizes people into lists on his twitter (his Women in Science list has 590 members.. WOW!) to keep it organize!  
One tip from Adam about growing your PLN is that the number of followers doesn't matter, it's the connections that are important. Check out the full webcast below!



Presentation Tools
Everyone knows about PowerPoint, but did you know that there are a bunch of tools to help you make presentations?  Presenting has grown past PowerPoint and its original uses, to aid someones verbal presentation, and online tools have become very beneficial.  Some online tools that you can use are Slideshare, Prezi, VoiceThread, and Poll Everywhere.  

Prezi is a tool, just like PowerPoint where you make slides and put information on them.  Instead of just having a bunch of info on each slide, the Prezi makes the presentation more entertaining and interesting!  One of my teachers used a template that looked like a tree, with each leaf being a different slide.  The presentation was shown by hopping from leaf to leaf!  And the presentations don't have to be linear either.  The presenter can lay the information on a canvas and draw a path and click through it! So much more interesting than PowerPoint.

Slideshare is a tool that lets people share presentations to people around the globe!  Everything you upload automatically gets converted into their format and gives others the ability to look through everything without having to download it.  If your teachers or other professionals in your field are using it than it's a great tool because it can catch you up on things you may have missed at a conference, in the classroom, or give you the opportunity to see what other's in your industry are studying and presenting about.

Poll Everywhere is great because it can be connected to your phone.  A teacher can poll a question, multiple choice or open ended, and students can have it sent to their phones and answer instantaneously.  A free teacher profile gives you the opportunity to get forty responses to polls and also download the polls into a PowerPoint.  With a paid subscription you can do even more like upload student names, input the correct answer to the poll, and have the site automatically grade the students based on their answers.


VoiceThread gives you the ability to share videos and photos along with comments.  These comments can be through text, audio, or video.  It is a really great tool for digital storytelling and even though it is simple, it's effective.  There is also a paid subscription version of Voicethread where you can create student accounts and upload unlimited files.

Ted Talks, Have a life that is truly awesome.

Some of you may have heard of TED Talks and some of you may not.  You're thinking, "who is Ted and why would I wanna listen to him talk?"  But TED is actually a nonprofit organization that has one mission, to spread ideas.  You can either go to conferences or watch online to listen to extremely amazing people speak about a myriad of different topics from The Mysterious World of Underwater Caves to Failure or even the Piano.  

One video that I personally really like is Neil Pasricha: The 3 A's of Awesome.  Even through a really tough time in his life, Neil was able to look at life and realize how awesome it is.  Through Neils experiences, he started to write a blog called 1000 Awesome Things which eventually went viral and earned him a Webi for Best Blog of the Year and a book called The Book of Awesome.  In the TED Talk Neil talks about the 3 A's of awesome, attitude, awareness, and authenticity, and how living with these three A's in mind will make life awesome.  Our attitude make our lives better or worse.  You can hit a slump in your life and feel bad about yourself and have a bad attitude and it's not going to get any better, but with a good attitude you can make it through any day.  With awareness, he mentions how it's like being a 3 year old discovering the world for the first time.  Always be aware because at one time you too saw something for the first time and never let go of that feeling of amazement and excitement.  Authenticity is about being true to who you are and loving who you are.  For instance, I am very passionate about travel and when I have the opportunity, and finances, to travel I do it.  Some people look down upon spending your money rather than saving, but I believe that the experiences I have from travelling make life awesome.  Now go give yourself an awesome life.

Some other awesome TED Talks
Monica Lewinsky: The Price of Shame - Monica Lewinsky talks about her experience with cyber bullying and shame.  Getting through a seriously rough time when her life where compassion and empathy outweighed the shame.  She said that we need to change our culture and stop the shaming.  

Rite Pierson: Every Kid Needs a Champion - Rita Pierson talks about her years as an educator and how the teachers attitude and presence in the classroom can change the education and confidence of any child. "I am somebody.  I was somebody when I came, I'll be a better somebody when I leave.  I am powerful and I am strong. I deserve the education that I get here.  I have things to do, people to impress, and places to go."

There's an App for That

What is an App Smackdown?!
It is not as violent or as angry as it sounds, it's mainly just telling other people about an app, how it is used, and how it connects to your prospective field.  We did this recently in my class and it was interesting to learn about all of the apps that my classmates currently use and the ones that they found.  
The app that I presented was called Skyscanner which is a airline discount app.  It is super easy to use and brings you straight to the airlines website when booking, which made it clear that it was safe.  I have used it on multiple occasions to book trips, including my most recent trip to Europe saving me an estimate of $250 on airfare.  The app has a few different characteristics that I find extremely helpful including the ratings, on a scale of 1-10, and the rankings, always showing you the cheapest option on top.  It is also easier to navigate than if you were to use a regular airline's website. 

Other fun features:

• The "Everywhere" option giving you the opportunity to search through different countries
• The option to look at the cheapest months to travel to certain destinations
• Getting price notifications when prices change

Other Apps?

Evernote is also a great app to have when taking notes, sharing notes, and just keeping everything organized!  You can add all types of notes, pictures, drawings, voice recordings, and hyperlinks into a single notes to make sure everything is in one place.  You can also scan items onto your notes and search previous notes using anything written in it. 






Here's a little introduction to the app!

If you want to learn more about Evernote, here are some links to check out!
Evernote for Students gives 19 tips for students that want to use Evernote!  Want to make note taking easier and take your time? Take a picture of the board or PowerPoint presentation, place it into your Evernote and go back to it later when you can take the time to focus on it more in depth!  Also, use the web clipper for research projects.  It's a great way to keep all of your information in one space!
The Ultimate Simplified Guide uses videos to help you learn how to use the app!  If you are a visual learner, this article can really help!  It even shows you how to make flashcards to help you study.

The Connected Educator
- Developing a Connected Learning Model
This chapter of The Connected Educator talks about Connected Learning Communities, a new model for professional development with a three pronged model including Local Community, Global Network, and Bounded Community.  With this model you can focus on face-to-face (Professional Learning Communities), online (Professional Learning Networks), and either-or (Communities of Practice) to broaden your communities.  So what do these Connected Learning Communities do? Well, they give educators, or any professional, the opportunity to connect with colleagues locally and globally.  It is a way to use your communities focus on creating, innovating, and learning all while collaborating with other professionals.  

Private is Professional

Do you have your settings on private?

Do you think that your posts are private, or that no one can track your location from the pictures you post?  Well a website, Ready or Not can show you just how wrong you are.  By putting in your Instagram or Twitter handle you can see recent posts and where they were posted.  This is done using the location tags on your phone.  If you really want to be private, go to your phone settings and turn off the location setting for your apps.  For personal safety reasons it's good to have this feature turned off.  

Public or Private?
As you start easing your way into the professional world, you might want to start thinking about making your social media accounts private.  This funny Youtube video makes a serious point about that by showing you how easy it is for someone to find your information on social media sites.


Although this video is a serious invasion of privacy, he does nothing illegal and it is a good idea, for personal AND professional reasons, to make most of your sites private.

So what about everything on a non private account?

That's all in your digital footprint!

Today, everyone is sharing everything, and sometimes too much, online.  An article by Joe Ross, he talks about thinking twice about what you put on social media.  It is important to think twice before posting anything because once it is on the internet, it's permanent.

Your digital footprint can turn into digital baggage just like in this video titled Attention Young Professionals! What's Your Digital Baggage? A man named Jarred is applying for a new job and during his interview the interviewer searches him and finds some very unflattering information about him.  Start thinking NOW about what you want potential employers to see and what you wouldn't want them to see.  Then, maybe don't put certain things, like pictures or statuses about calling in sick and going to the beach, up on social media accounts.

So just what is YOUR digital footprint?  This post gives a lot of information about how your digital footprint can define who you are as a professional candidate.  While some employers think looking at someones personal profiles can actually help them land the job, almost double the amount of employers believe that it will hurt a candidates chance.

Time to go back and check your accounts!

But what about a PLN?
PLN's are different because you want to be able to share the information you find with everyone.  It is not only a place for YOU to learn, but to spread the knowledge about your field.  
Some of my tweets on my Twitter account have been getting retweeted, which couldn't happen if that account was private.  This account is strictly professional, so what you have on there should be professional and mainly information on the field or topic of your choice. Since my Twitter isn't set on private, this also gives me the opportunity to communicate with people that don't follow me and have interactions like the one below where American Airlines thought that my hashtag #GEN2243 was in response to my flight being delayed.

@CJ_Hage We're showing AA 2243 already departed. Can you check the flight number again please?

— American Airlines (@AmericanAir) February 12, 2016

@CJ_Hage That's pretty neat! We're glad we could be apart of it. Best of luck with your studies.

— American Airlines (@AmericanAir) February 12, 2016

Other ways to share your information!?
The book, Untangling the Web by Steve Dembo and Adam Bellow talks about using the web, from a educational perspective.  The first chapter talks a lot about the different ways of organizing information on the web including sites like Delicious, which was one of the original link sharing sites, Diigo, mainly for sharing bookmarks, Educlipper, which lets you export your findings to other sites, and SymbalooEDU, which is comprised of a list of icons.  The authors go into detail about public bookmarking and how the we are now a big part of organizing information for people.  Many people also use tagging, or folksonomies, to organize their information and make it easier for people to find.  Tagging is now used in many online platforms like Youtube and blogging which is when you connect your video or post to key words that people can use to search for that information.
One of my other classes is having us make blogs that organized links having to do with our major.  All of the links on MY BLOG pertain to the cruising industry and it is just an organized blog of information.  



Cameron Brenchley
We had a guest speaker in my class this past week, Cameron Brenchley.  Cameron is the VP at Collaborative Communications, an education PR firm in Washington, DC.  He has also had other jobs that focused on PR and Social Media.  One of these jobs included being the first Director of Digital Strategy for the US Department of Education.  In the video below he talks about going from a fast pace government job to his new position that gives him much longer time frames to work on his projects!  He also talks about using social media in a more private and professional setting!  Check out the video below to hear him answer more questions.

I Don't Know, Go Google It.

Google and It's many Uses!

This week in my class, Exploring your Digital Portfolio, we learned about Google and the different ways to use it.  Some interesting applications that Google offers are Google Scholar, Google Drive, Google Docs, and Google Hangouts.  All of these features make it easier because you ultimately have everything in one place.  Google has basically become a one stop shop for all things personal, school, and business related.  

One interesting thing that our teacher Kyle Calderwood showed us was the research tool on Google Docs.  With this tool you can find quotes by many famous people, images of anything, tables of information, and research about an infinite amount of topics.  It's a quick way to access information without having to open a separate page.

  

Some Articles to Look At --

These articles will give you a closer look at Google Drive, Google Hangouts, and Google Docs!

16 Secrets of Google Drive is an article by David Chartier which talks about tips to help you utilize Google Drive to it's full potential.  Before reading this article I thought that Google Drive was mainly a glorified flash drive, but it is actually the main source for everything that you do in your Google account.  

This article my Don Crowther is all about how to use Google Hangouts to help build your business.  Along with a recorded broadcast embedded into the post, he talks about the endless possibilities available while using this Google feature, which not only gives you the ability to talk to multiple people from anywhere face to face, but also gives you the ability to record your hangouts and live stream them on youtube.  You can also use this feature to share your screen and give tutorials.  I have already used Google Hangouts this semester for school and some of my other teachers have talked about using it as well.  Plus, it is a great way to break the barrier of distance!

This last article about Google Docs, written by Charles Cooper, talks about how he finally made the decision to switch from using Microsoft Word to using Google Docs, even though Word is obviously superior.  Cooper says some of his reasoning behind switching was the fact that it's free, constantly improving, and works well with the email system he uses in his office.  It also lets people share and edit the same document in real time.  Personally, Google Docs has been an amazing tool as a commuter because it makes working in groups, or having people proof read my papers, so much easier.

Professional Learning Networks!

These past couple weeks my class and I have been starting to construct our own Personal Learning Networks which I talked about in my last blog.  Through twitter we are connecting with professionals throughout our future career fields, mine being hospitality, and creating a network for ourselves.  

Here are some of the people that I've started to follow and the articles that they've posted--

Great video about redesigning tourism infrastructure! Thanks for retweeting it @AnthonyHotels! https://t.co/RIt0TQdCdI

— Cassandra Hage (@CJ_Hage) February 9, 2016

This was in response to a video about the redesign for LaGuardia, an international airport in New York.  As a hospitality major I have heard about this redesign already and it was really interesting to see the design completed.

How to Successfully Manage Your #Hotel #OnlineReputation?https://t.co/JGN29Y8W4s#HotelMarketing pic.twitter.com/2CMCKpK4HD via @Hotelogix

— Alexvoyagenco (@alexvoyagenco) February 8, 2016

Today, managing your reputation on social media is very important whether it be for your personal, professional, or business pages.  This article that I retweeted gave a few tips on how to handle it.

Study: Airbnb poses threat to hotel industry https://t.co/jP8miox38d via @USATODAY @Airbnb #hotels

— Nancy Trejos (@nancytrejos) February 2, 2016

Airbnb is a fairly new concept in the Hospitality world that has become quite prevalent.  Some people in the industry think it is a unique and interesting way to travel and support it while other believe it is taking business away from hotels.