#TeachAgChat Reflection

Leading Up to the Event: #TeachAgChat!!!!!

So my initial thoughts were... wait, we are leading a National Twitter Chat... what does that even mean. After discussing the particulars in the class, I started to feel more comfortable with the idea. Then, my teammates (Katie and Mason) and I all participated in a National Twitter Chat to see what they were like. After this, I started to get more excited. The sheer amount of resources shared and connections made in one hour blew my mind.

Once we established our objective, we were ready to go!

Objective: Connect and familiarize educators and industry personnel with the needs and preparation of students to ensure career success

So then... we were just waiting for #TeachAgChat ... #Oct15 ... #BeThereOrBeSquare!

The Event:

GEMS
- I think that we did a good job of promoting the #TeachAgChat. We sent emails, tweeted, facebooked, talked and did everything we could to promote the event. We were very happy to see educators, students, and agricultural industry people attend the event!

- We also did a great job preparing beforehand. I think that we all had great responses and resources to share. This helped the #TeachAgChat night go more smoothly

-Having TweetDeck up allowed us to see the whole conversation, and made it easier to retweet, respond, like, and see where the conversation was going.

- I also thought that we had enough points and questions because there seemed to be little lag time.

- Roles: I think that Katie, Mason and I shared the responsibilities very well. The night of, we each had specific roles to make sure that everything was covered.



OPPS

- I think it was too confusing to have designated questions for Teachers versus Industry personnel. Also because many people we contacted beforehand to participate had never been in a Twitter Chat, having the questions geared towards the two groups was probably confusing!
So HINDSIGHT: clarify questions

- It seemed like we had more educators than industry people. It would have been nice to have more voices in the discussion. So HINDSIGHT: get more industry support in the #TeachAgChat

FINAL THOUGHTS

I was very impressed by the engagement of the participants! We had very thought provoking questions and interesting ideas shared. I really enjoyed the experience. Thanks for reading!

Best

sb_royer