Robert Mapp – @robertmapp5
Lisa Abbott – @lisaabbott75
Birmingham City University

Faced with the challenge of creating a well-connected large student population of over 2000 students, we decided to try out Twitter and created the @BCUNursingteam page.  

In this thunderstorm we will showcase our twitter journey, and strategies we took to firstly increase our followers and get people interested and not scared to tweet. We hoped that twitter would provide the platform to increase connectivity and empower our students to engage with each other, academic staff, the university, employers and the nursing community. 

Using social media in a nursing education environment where students are in a public role and are held professionally responsible for their actions was an interesting challenge to embark upon. This meant we needed to understand the professional impact of being so visible on social media, and ensure that we supported students to understand this too. Part of hosting the page created the need to be role models to students to demonstrate how to apply personal experience in a professional sphere and become digitally capable in a social world.

We will demonstrate how the @BCUNursingteam page has enhanced the student experience through regular tweets about student activities, social events and celebrating student achievement as well as delivering key information. This has created a community for Birmingham City University student nurses and staff, enhancing the student’s sense of belonging and developing social capital