SkoolPool now officially has 7,011 school profiles in its database. Students are requesting schools from countries all over the world, although still primarily Canada, US and UK. Schools are signing up daily for both our free packages and our premium Facebook Page packages as well. The University of Maryland is our newest Interactive customer - their Facebook Page went live yesterday and already has what looks like student fans.

Above: Screenshot of the University of Maryland's new SkoolPool Interactive Facebook Page

The University of Maryland School of Nursing quickly followed suit with its own department page. (Note: The School of Nursing went with our free package, which means only users with SkoolPool installed on their Facebook will be able to see it). Department pages were not originally part of our plan but with several departments signing up via the school form in our first month, we quickly developed an option for them that went live at the end of January. The joy of having programmers in house!

Above: Screenshot of School of Nursing SP Just the Basics department profile

Oh, did I say there was a new feature? Yes, yes I did - and there is! We have just gone live with our new "Meet Future Classmates" feature, as of today! We've noticed from watching student behaviour on Facebook that many are looking to meet their future classmates before the school year starts. For example, as a member of several "Class of 2012" Facebook Groups, I have been added by literally hundreds of university and college applicants who wanted to get in touch. I'm a big fan of the whole Jane Jacobs "watch where people walk and let them show you where to build a sidewalk" line of thought, and that is a little bit what we are doing here ... watching how students are using technology and then giving them tools that not only support these behaviours but make them easier and more widespread to kids who hadn't thought of it yet.

The "Meet Future Classmates" feature will be seen on user's profiles, in the mini-footer beneath each school that is displayed. The mini-footer will now read "Edit | Add this School | Meet Future Classmates | Discuss." The MFC feature will also appear on the MySchools page, which is the default landing page inside the application. The MySchools page lists all the schools that a student has selected - the same as the profile box does - but simply in a larger format. A "Meet Future Classmates" link has been added below each school shown on the MySchools page. Previously users were only able to see "friends" that were considering or attending a school, but now students can see any student that has not set their privacy settings otherwise. Check it out:

Above: MySchools page with new Meet Future Classmates link

Above: An example of the Meet Future Classmates page. In this case, I am being shown my potential future classmates if I were to attend Redeemer University College. All non-Academica Group staff are blurred out.

This is the last thing I will show you in regards to this feature: Users can also filter their "Future Classmates" by application status (Considering, Applied, Received Offer, Accepted Offer/Attending).

Above: Screenshot of MFC filtering options

So that is it! We hope you think this new feature is a worthwhile addition - we are certainly hoping that students will appreciate it. And remember, there are more than 7,000 school profiles in SkoolPool - more than likely a student has already added your school. SkoolPool's free "Just the Basics" lets you take your page from blah to boom, by adding logo, tagline, contact info etc.

The SkoolPool Team

@ Academica Group Inc.
Full Cycle Marketing for Higher Education™

Check out our all-new website - www.academicagroup.com

131 Wharncliffe Road South, Second Floor, London, Ontario, Canada N6J 2K4
tel 519.433.8302 ext. 2156 1.866.922.8636
fax 519.433.8062 skoolpool@academicagroup.com

Nod to Kyle James over at .eduguru for recommending the Firefox screen capture widget that I used to take the screenshots above!