This week on the show, Lougan chats with front-end web developer Nikki Massaro Kauffman. She develops open source web components to make Penn State University’s online courses accessible, media rich, and interactive. Nikki has always been passionate about teaching, and she translates that love into mentoring. Lougan and Nikki talk about the importance of mentorship, making mistakes and failure.

Links to cool stuff: 

• Nikki on Twitter
• Nikki on Linkedin
• Lougan’s 2017 Lightning Talk 

This week on the show, we sat down with RJ Thompson, the associate director of student engagement in the College of Business Administration at the University of Pittsburg. RJ’s career in higher education has been in an interesting one. He’s always had a passion for teaching students, and has worked as a both an adjunct and a tenured professor. We talk about RJ’s long career as a professor and why he decided to move from faculty to staff. We also chat about Star Trek: Picard, but no worries. We don’t talk spoilers. 

Links to cool stuff: 

• RJ’s Website
• RJ on Linkedin

Jenna Spinelle is the communications specialist for the McCourtney Institute for Democracy at Penn State. She describes herself as a team of one, where she handles digital content and media outreach. She is also host of the Institute’s Democracy Works podcast which is produced in partnership with WPSU Penn State, Pennsylvania’s NPR station. Lougan and Jenna have a great chat about working her work hosting Democracy Works, podcasting and listening to audio books. Also, apologies for Lougan’s audio quality. We’ve had some issues with his microphone and are working to fix it. 

Links to cool stuff: 

• Jenna on LinkedIn
• Jenna on Twitter
• Listen to Democracy Works
• Jenna’s Website

This week, Lougan talks with Brendan Foley, the director of communications for the Morehead-Cain Foundation at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Brendan is responsible for creating and implementing a content strategy that supports Morehead-Cain’s many goals. Whether it’s recruiting the brightest students across the globe or inspiring alumni to participate in the Foundation’s first-ever capital campaign, Brendan creates content that encompasses every aspect of student and alumni journeys.

On the show, we discuss Brendan’s work and how he made the jump from award-winning broadcast news producer and journalist to higher education. Brendan’s wife Jenna Hartwell is also an Higher Ed Social alum! Check out Jenna’s episode from October 2018!

Links to cool stuff: 

• Brendan on Twitter
• Brendan on LinkedIn
• Morehead-Cain Foundation

Jason Miller is the digital specialist at York University in Toronto, Canada. As part of the central communications office, Jason’s has his hands in a lot of digital work, but his primary job is to develop the university-wide social media strategy and assist various areas across campus with their digital strategies. Lougan and Jason talk about the quirks of being in charge of social media, and why we love doing what we do. We also talk about the fun little things he does outside his role, and how doing those types of things are important.

Links to cool stuff: 

• Jason on Twitter
• Jason on Linkedin

Eric Stoller is the vice president of digital strategy at GeckoEngage. You may know him from his articles on Inside Higher Ed, his speaking engagements and his consulting work around digital engagement. He’s always loved doing marketing and public relations, but never wanted to work for an agency. Eric’s experiences in student development services at University of Illinois Chicago and enrollment management at Oregon State University really cemented interest in the intersection of technology and student success. He’s had an incredible and unique journey through the world of higher education. 

Links to cool stuff

• Eric on Twitter
• Eric on LinkedIn
• GeckoEngage

What’s better than actually going to the HighEdWeb Conference? Recording an episode with your friends that actually went! At least that’s what Lougan is telling himself this week as he welcomes Jackie and Jon-Stephen back to the show along with new guest Alaina Wiens. We chat about what it’s like running social media for the conference, and the various presentations they gave. We also talk about the “golden nuggets” they are taking back home this year. 

Links to cool stuff: 

• Jackie: Twitter | Linkedin
• Jon-Stephen: Twitter | Linkedin
• Alaina: Twitter | Linkedin
• 2019 HighEdWeb Conference Website
• HighEdWeb’s Recorded Live Streams
• HighEdWeb Association Website

Ravi Jain from Boston College joins us on the show this week! Ravi serves as the Senior Associate Director of Digital Media & Web at Boston College. We talk with Ravi about being selected as an inaugural INBOUND2019 Fellow and his upcoming talk at INBOUND 2019. Ravi tells us more about why he’s become a short form video evangelist and how he uses micro-storytelling to tell the story of the different “cities” at BC. We also discuss why vinyl sounds better and the fun and agony of designing email templates.

Links to cool stuff: 

• Ravi on Twitter
• Ravi on LinkedIn
• INBOUND19

For our second international episode, we sat down with Melissa Mae Cheater, the digital content manager at Western University in London, Ontario, Canada. Melissa is also the founder of #PSEWEB (Post Secondary Education Web), a Canadian offshoot of the Higher Education Web Professionals Association here in the US. During the show, we chat about the differences between student life in the US and Canada. Melissa also shares her thoughts on how departments across campus can better work with their communications teams to celebrate success. 

Links to cool stuff: 

• Melissa on Twitter
• Melissa on LinkedIn
• Melissa’s website
• #PSEWEB
• Link Journal article on Melissa’s #heweb18 presentation

This week we talked with Jon Blankenship, the director of digital media strategy for Vanderbilt University Development & Alumni Relations. Jon worked with Lougan at Belmont for more than 8 years before his move across Wedgewood Avenue to Vanderbilt. We talk about Jon’s previous position at Belmont where he was tasked with transitioning the oversight of website content over to university marketing. We also chat about his new position at Vanderbilt working on web, email and social media strategy. 

Links to cool stuff

• Jon on Twitter
• Jon on LinkedIn