If students needed yet another Internet venue to peruse in an effort to procrastinate on schoolwork, they have found it through blogging.
Third-year College student Marie Connor estimated that she spends about two hours per day searching online for recipes on her favorite food blogs. Connor, who is particularly interested in French pastries and bakeries, said she has found "online recipes, cooking techniques and interesting perspectives on how to apply food for certain occasions."
In addition, Connor explained that she has been following about 30 to 40 University students on Twitter since early summer 2011 in an "attempt to keep up with the news and follow humorous [Twitter accounts], such as the [fake account for President Teresa A.] Sullivan, Stephen Colbert and Will Ferrell.
"I'm not into Twitter as an attempt to blog because it allows users to share superfluous information," said Connor, who keeps a Twitter account herself just for posting favorite recipes about once or twice a month.
Third-year Architecture students Kaitlyn Badlato and Morgan Stackman created a blog when the pair went to Switzerland for a study abroad program, but they have not updated the blog nor created a new one since the trip over the summer.
Badlato called blogs "our generation's travel journal," recalling the journals she kept while traveling on a program in middle school. She said she still flips through it occasionally to remember "all the small moments that made the trip."
Badlato and Stackman took turns posting photos and journal entries to their joint site and re-blogging posts from fellow classmates on the trip. Badlato said she found it challenging to post on the blog constantly, yet rewarding when she received positive feedback from followers.
Badlato's study abroad program required all participants to make a blog and post at least once. "It was interesting to see all of the different perspectives and directions everyone took," she added.
Darden student David Miller also began blogging while traveling in Europe. Miller said a friend encouraged him to record his travels to share with family and friends at home in America.
Connor added that another positive aspect of blogging while abroad was saving money on postcards and long-distance phone calls, because family and friends could check the site to see what she was doing.
"I think blogging while studying abroad is definitely following the Facebook trend," Badlato said. "Our generation loves to tell everyone about what they're doing through Facebook and Twitter and now through blogs."
Now that he has returned to the states, Miller maintains his blog, "College 2.0.," to chronicle the daily life of a University graduate student.
"I had also read several student blogs while deciding which schools to apply to, so I saw as a great way to give back to the U.Va. community," Miller said, adding that he's not sure if he will maintain the blog after he graduates in the spring.
For some student bloggers, their online output is part of an academic assignment rather than a voluntary undertaking.
Fourth-year College and Education student Samantha Keating said she has had to maintain blogs for several of her Education classes. Assignments involved watching videos on educational instruction methods and blogging a reflection of how she felt about the demonstrated method, she said.
Throughout her courses, Keating said she found the learning and teaching with technology to be helpful.
"As a future teacher I definitely feel that technology can be a very powerful resource to have in the classroom," she said. "It can give students an outlet to show their creativity and provide an additional method in which to teach a particular subject ... Teachers just need to be careful to not let flashy technology overshadow the content they are trying to teach."
Although she found the blogging to be an effective means to share information for these education classes, Keating did not necessarily enjoy completing the assignment and has not started a blog herself or begun following those of friends.
"I wouldn't say that I enjoyed the blogging, but as a person who has difficulty getting her thoughts together quickly enough to speak in class, the blogging allowed me to have time to think about my response before posting it to share with the rest of my class," she said.
Though their enthusiasm for blogging may vary, students aren't the only ones logging online to express their interests or share information. Other organizations, offices and even university deans have jumped on the bandwagon and have created blogs.
The athletic department updates "The Wahoo Blog" with the latest sports news. The Office of Admission has created several blogs covering topics from financial aid to student life, all of which are intended to offer prospective students a more accessible and user-friendly means to obtain information. Madison House has its own blog to share information about volunteering opportunities both in and outside the University. Even the University Housing Division and the sustainability coordinator of University Dining maintain online blogs.
When asked about the appeal of the online sites, Connor said "blogging is popular because it allows people to share interests and participate in a virtual and sometimes intellectual community"
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