Social Media for International Students Outreach. Lessons from Scandinavia

Abstract

Social media have been around for over a decade and many institutions have incorporated them into their communication strategies for some time now. However, despite numerous studies on social media in the US universities, there is a wide knowledge gap regarding the use of these communication platforms in the European higher education sphere, with only a handful of studies in the UK and Netherlands. This research project aimed to fill this gap by surveying the use of social media for international student outreach at higher education institutions in Scandinavia. Using a mixed-methods research design and a digital ethnography methodological approach, I collected and analyzed 45 self-completion online questionnaires and five semistructured interviews with the universities’ communications staff. The results provided with a detailed image of the social media practices at the surveyed institutions, with particular emphasis on the channels used, the institutional costs and benefits and best practice advice for similar institutions. This study brings original contributions to the knowledge in two separate fields wed by globalization: social media communications and international higher education. The implications of the findings go beyond the initial research goal and indicate important internal institutional changes in connection with wider global processes and market realities