1} “How might your digital footprint affect your future opportunities?”
- your online “persona” , how you act, and present yourself on social media could either enforce or diminish your opportunities for jobs, universities, and colleges.
- If employers at your job are looking through your social media account(s) (Instagram, Facebook, etc.) and find pictures of you doing something irresponsible, abusive, harmful, or dangerous; then their opinion of you as a person might become negative, and don’t want to hire you. They don’t want to put themselves, other workers, customers, and even their company in danger if you seem dangerous or untrustworthy. Especially with more serious and important jobs such as banks and politics, they need someone they can rely on and trust to handle sensitive or personal information, to be responsible, and maybe even academically efficient. If you make a rant on Facebook complaining you got all f’s on your report card and dropping out, they might not want to hire you if you have poor education, a failing effort, and little perseverance.
- Sometimes you can’t control what other people put you online for. It could be a negative opinion on you, maybe a compliment; who knows.
- Information recorded or documented on social media can tell people more information about you. If the university you are applying for finds a newspaper article of you online about how you received a scholarship or made a positive influence in the community, they will be pleased. If they find your name in the news for getting arrested because of drinking and driving; not so much.
2} Describe some strategies you can use to keep your digital footprint appropriate and safe.
- Monitoring what you say or do on social media is crucial on how you present yourself. Swearing, cussing, or using racial slurs may seem harmless to you, or between your friend group; but people looking at your account from the outside might see you as inconsiderate or rude. I use this trick all the time: if you can’t show your parents the picture, comment, or caption; then don’t post it at all.
- If you have an account with any photos of yourself or family, make sure you make it a private account. (people need your permission to follow you and see your photos. You can accept or deny their request) Only accept follow requests from people you know personally or at school. Everyone else is a stranger that could potentially want to find more about you… And not in a good way… If anyone you don’t know tries to contact them using that social media; especially if you’ve denied their request and they’re asking you something that’s personal or harassing, you BLOCK and REPORT them. You don’t need to communicate to them. In fact, you shouldn’t.
- As I’ve mentioned before, You can’t control everything about you that goes on the internet, but you can control what YOU put on the internet about you, and you can do the same with your friends. It is courtesy to politely ask you if they can post something or write something about you if you’re in it, and if you say no; they should listen. If they don’t, then contact them and ask them why they did. Then report the image, and let them be. Sometimes someone posts something of you already, and they never asked you. If you want to, kindly contact them and ask if they can take the image down; and explain why you don’t want to be. They should comply with your request. If they don’t, then simply report the image. If you want to be in the image, then that’s fine. But still contact the person and tell them to notify you before posting a photo of you.
3} What information did you learn that you would pass on to other students? How would you go about telling them?
I learned that there are unsuspecting things about you lurking in the deep dark corners of the internet, and that I should always be aware of what I do, post, and comment. Building my online personality is just as important as building my normal one in real life; especially since technology is becoming more of importance and utility in our lives than ever. I understand that people will always judge me on what I say or act like, so I must strive to make myself as good of a person to others as possible; in person and on all my social media. My digital personality will only grow as I grow older. With every Instagram post and like, My digital portfolio will expand and shape the perspective others have on me. I will always be respectful, caring, accepting, compassionate, welcoming, honest, and courteous of everyone. I would honestly just make a blog post about it. I would love to tell everyone I know to be safe on social media. If one of my friends or fellow students posted something that wasn’t going to help them in the future, or was not very good; then I’d just let them know and warn them. Now that I’ve learned how exposed an unprotected we are to hackers, and untrustworthy people; I feel more motivated then ever to be the best me possible. In the real world and in the world of technology.*all images hand drawn by me*