An Assessment of the Emerging Media Campaign Utilized to Engage the UW-Stout Career and Technical Education Graduate Student

Abstract

Engaged communication is key to the success of online graduate students (Salter, 2012), and as such, fundamental to the success of the Career and Technical Education (CTE) hybrid (online and face-to-face coursework) graduate programs at University of Wisconsin-Stout. Further, research has shown engagement of the online student results in increased student retention (Salter, 2012; Junco & Timm, 2008; Tinto, 1993). To better engage the CTE graduate students, an emerging media campaign was developed, including an eNewsletter and LinkedIn Group. This study sought to determine if this campaign increased engagement for the current group of 59 CTE graduate students. By using existing quantitative data from the eNewsletter and LinkedIn Group, and both quantitative and qualitative data from an online survey of the CTE graduate students, this mixed methods study revealed that the emerging media campaign was indeed successful in increasing student engagement. More specifically, this study and reviewed research shows that a well- selected emerging media platform paired with frequently posted, relevant content can indeed increase the engagement and community desired for the online graduate student.