It has already been firmly established that social media plays a crucial role in the higher education community. However, we haven’t answered one important question – can social media improve student academic performance?
We know that it can do a lot in the ways of marketing for the school, establishing connections and relationships for the students, and even helping them get information faster and easier. But can it improve their performance?
Let’s take a look:
Are Students Active on Social Media?
Some people might consider this question redundant, especially the students who know that social media is already a big part of their lives. However, most of us don’t know just how big a part it is. According to the latest studies, an overwhelming 96% of students with access to the Internet use social media platforms.
As we already know, most of the students in the developed world have access to the internet, so we can safely say that almost every student in the west is using social media. What’s more, some 59% of these students tend to talk about education on these platforms.
One question remains though – is this activity beneficial for their academic performance, or is it perhaps detrimental?
Is Social Media Beneficial or Detrimental to the Academic Performance of Students?
Despite what the social media cynics are saying, social media on its own is not detrimental to the students’ overall academic performance. Social media is merely a tool, and when it’s used in the right way, it can be very helpful to their academic life. Studies have already been done on this topic, and most, if not all, have affirmed this idea.
Most of the researchers are positive that social media is a tool, and if used correctly, it can be very beneficial to the student’s academic performance. They also say that if used carelessly and without thought, it will be detrimental, mostly because it will waste the students’ time – time that they would have otherwise used to improve their grades.
What can social media do for students if they use it wisely?
- If students use it for learning the same things they learn through their studies, it can make those studies more fun and easy.
- If they use it to watch informative videos, it can improve their practical skills.
- If they use it to find the latest data on educational topics, it becomes a great aid in research projects.
- If the students use it to find relevant data for their assignments, they can do them faster and often better.
- They can use it as a study guide by looking for material and resources through social media platforms.
- Social media platforms are often the place where many advancements in specific fields are shared, so students can use it to stay on top of the latest developments in their field.