I took over @iamdepaul! (pt.1)
Thanks to being a Content Creator at DePaul, I had the opportunity to take over the @iamdepaul Instagram account over the summer break. This was a great way for me to reflect on my freshman year in the US and this led me to be thankful for all the different lessons and experiences that came my way since last September. My goal for this project was simple: to help people with their journey here through what I have learned.
Everyone and anyone can represent themselves and their stories on the Instagram page. The whole point of this account is to showcase different students at DePaul so that followers can connect with different aspects of each post and get more insight into what it is like/will be for them when they come to DePaul.
My journey began when I filled out the form which is linked in the account’s bio. This is a mandatory step that essentially alerts the people in charge of the account about you as a person and what you want to bring to the table. Here you must provide details like your major, minor, and where you are from.
After this step, I had a meeting with the Content Editor & Producer: Maria Hench. She wanted to get more details about my aim and asked further questions which intrigued her. Then she let me know that I would have to wait a couple of months for my turn as this is a very popular activity! (If you want to take over @iamdepaul, start today so you won’t have to wait longer.) We also discussed details about the actual takeover and then it was a waiting game.
I had a lot of time to prepare. I wanted to have a positive impact on the DePaul community and wanted to utilise this time to have all my captions (which were essentially mini blogs) ready to post.
I decided to focus on five different topics:
- Myself (every @iamdepaul post starts with an introduction)
- DePaul/ Education
- Friends
- Food
- Chicago
Every day I posted multiple photos with a blog in the caption which gave insight into my background with respect to that respective topic followed by some tips/ advice for the followers. For the sixth day, I conducted a Q&A session on the account’s story (more about that in pt.2) and ended my takeover with a reel that had a thank you note for everyone who read everything I had to say that whole week.
Overall, I had a lot of fun and felt very good after completing this task and would highly encourage other students to take over @iamdepaul once while they are here for two main reasons:
- Help others
- Have a forever record about a part of your journey at DePaul on the official account.
Follow @iamdepaul to stay updated. See you in part 2!
Apply to DePaul!
– Xo, Tani