In early October, several Missouri State staff attended the HighEdWeb 2013 Conference in Buffalo, New York. As always, the conference offered information-packed sessions and provided networking opportunities with other higher education Web professionals.

What we learned

Below are some takeaways that our staff gathered at conference sessions:

Placemarks to the People

Recommendation from Grayson Gordon

Gabriel Nagmay (Portland Community College) presented a WordPress plugin he created that allows users to define placemarks. This plugin provides detailed information and can be used in pages and posts by entering the placemark’s shortcode. He gave examples of how his college is using the placemarks to create a self-guided art walk, showing the accessibility options available and highlighting the college’s sustainability efforts.  We will be looking into this for use in the next phase of our virtual tour.

Lessons Learned from a Lockdown: Using the Web and Social Media in a Crisis

Recommendation from Sara Clark

Cindy Sabato and Kerri Hicks (University of Rhode Island) presented a case study of a recent crisis on their campus. They described how your followers expect you to engage during a crisis and offered strategies for how to respond quickly and accurately. This session is great for the seasoned social media developer as well as crisis team members that are unfamiliar with online communications and expectations.

Turn that Job into a Profession

Recommendation from Chad Killingsworth

John Wagner (Princeton University) and George Sackett (St. Louis Community College) conducted a guided audience discussion on career advancement. Part of the discussion centered on challenging norms that to advance means to manage people. The other aspect included the discussion on career advancement does not have to imply promotion and should contain elements of self improvement.

Text First! Applying Progressive Enhancement to Multimedia Content

Recommendation from Brian Heaton

Nikki Massaro Kauffman and Heather Dawson (Penn State) explained that regardless of how media-rich your content is, it still should start with text first because as your content “breaks down” (e.g., smartphone won’t play the video) the content will still be present, so it must meet the needs of all your visitors.