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Higher education social media works best when each official account is treated as an institutional asset—not a personal side project. Define who may open and manage accounts, protect access and student privacy, make accessibility checks part of publishing, choose channels for real audiences, and measure results against institutional goals.
How do colleges manage social media accounts?
Start with a defined purpose and an accountable owner for every official account. The account should serve an institutional, school, department, or program goal, with a known audience and an approval route. Establish these basics before creating a profile; otherwise, an account can persist without clear responsibility, secure access, or a reason to continue.
Set ownership, approval, and access rules
- Require strategic review and authorization before an official account is created. The University of Michigan and Seton Hall both describe approval processes in their policies, though their procedures are institution-specific: Michigan’s social media policy and Seton Hall’s social media policy.
- Name an accountable owner and document who can publish, administer, approve, and recover the account. Seton Hall calls for at least two permanent university employee administrators; this is one institution’s rule, not a universal minimum.
- Use organization-controlled contact and recovery methods where platform and institutional rules allow. Avoid making an account dependent on one employee’s personal credentials.
- Record access in an institution-approved system and remove or revise privileges when staff change roles or leave. Northeastern’s policy addresses institutional control and access sharing when an account is linked to a personal profile: Northeastern’s social media policy.
- Define response coverage, escalation contacts, moderation practices, and emergency coverage. The University of Michigan notes that “Social communications and community management is a full-time job.” That is a warning about workload, not a staffing formula for every campus.
Plan content and responses
Maintain an editorial calendar that identifies the audience, purpose, owner, approver, publishing date, and any required permissions for each post. Set expectations for comments and direct messages: which questions can be answered publicly, who handles complaints or safety concerns, and where sensitive individual cases should go. A calendar without monitoring and escalation coverage is incomplete; Michigan’s policy calls for regular monitoring of social communications.
What should a university social media policy include?
A useful policy translates institutional requirements into decisions staff can follow. It should cover account creation, ownership, administrator roles, security, content approvals, monitoring, accessibility, privacy, rights and permissions, and account closure or transfer. It should also point employees to the institution’s applicable communications, records, security, and legal policies rather than attempting to replace them.
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Protect student privacy in public channels
Do not request or disclose student records or other protected information in comments or direct messages. If someone raises an individual matter, acknowledge it without confirming private details and direct them to an institution-approved secure channel or office. Seton Hall specifically bars using social accounts for confidential or protected information such as educational records; Rice’s brand guidance likewise connects social media activity with FERPA and other relevant privacy-law compliance. The laws and procedures that apply can depend on the institution and the situation, so staff should follow local policy and consult the appropriate campus office.
Address permissions and account transitions
Before sharing photographs, video, music, or user-generated material, confirm that the institution has the rights and permissions it needs and obtain consent where required by policy. Princeton recommends obtaining rights before sharing copyrighted material. State who can approve exceptions and how to handle a request to remove content.
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Include an offboarding procedure: transfer ownership and recovery information, remove departing staff’s access, update contact details, and confirm that the account remains under institutional control. Northeastern’s guidance is one example of a policy addressing ownership and control; the exact process should match the institution’s platform configuration and security rules.
How can universities make social media accessible?
Build accessibility into content creation and review rather than treating it as a final cleanup step. Rice describes social media as an extension of the university website and recommends accessible descriptions, captioning, sufficient contrast, and not relying on color alone. Its guide references WCAG 2.1 Level AA as its target; institutions should confirm the standards and legal requirements that currently apply to them.
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Use an accessibility checklist before publishing
- Images: Add meaningful alt text when the platform supports it. Describe the information or purpose that matters, rather than merely naming visible objects.
- Graphics and charts: Put essential facts in the post text or an accessible linked destination as well as in the image. Do not make color the only way to distinguish categories or communicate status.
- Video: Provide captions and check them for accuracy, including names and specialized terms. UAMS calls for human-verified captions in its guidance.
- Contrast and legibility: Check that text is readable against its background and at typical mobile sizes.
- Hashtags and emoji: Use CamelCase hashtags, such as
#CampusLife, so screen readers can distinguish words. Use emoji sparingly and do not rely on them to convey essential information. - Linked content: Check that the destination page, form, or document is accessible too; an accessible post does not fix an inaccessible resource.
Princeton’s guidance recommends alt text where available, video captions, CamelCase hashtags, judicious emoji use, and rights checks. UAMS states that its official social content is public-facing web content under the US Department of Justice Title II rule and gives April 26, 2027 as the compliance date applicable in its guidance. That is UAMS’s stated date and legal framing, not a universal deadline; institutions should verify current requirements and applicability for their own circumstances.
How should a college choose social media channels?
Choose channels based on the people an account needs to reach and the work it needs to do—not on a desire to be present everywhere. Research the audiences actually using each platform, identify what the institution can publish and monitor consistently, and match each channel’s format and capabilities to the account’s purpose. Michigan’s policy recommends audience research and understanding platform differences.
Michigan listed Instagram, Facebook, Threads, LinkedIn, X, TikTok, YouTube, Bluesky, and Reddit as active social media sites for the university as of March 1, 2025. This is a dated example of one university’s channels, not a current universal list or an endorsement for every campus. Verify current platform availability, audience fit, institutional approval, and the capacity to maintain each account before committing.
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Use tools approved through institutional security, privacy, procurement, and accessibility processes. University examples establish a need for institutional management capabilities: Michigan and Seton Hall name Sprout Social in their own operations. That does not establish that a particular product is right for every institution, nor does it provide a basis for ranking vendors.
Evaluate tools against operating needs
- Can the institution control account ownership, roles, permissions, and recovery?
- Does the tool support the approval workflow and publishing channels the team actually uses?
- Can it support accessibility checks or help staff manage descriptions and captions? Confirm exactly what is supported rather than assuming automation makes content accessible.
- Does it provide analytics and exports that answer the institution’s reporting questions?
- Does it meet institutional security, privacy, records, and procurement requirements?
- Are onboarding, ongoing administration, and total costs workable for the team’s capacity?
Compare shortlisted products using these criteria and verify current features, contracts, and pricing directly with the vendor and institutional reviewers. The cited university policies do not establish a comparative product assessment.
What metrics should a university track on social media?
Choose measures that correspond to each account’s purpose. Seton Hall describes engagement rates, audience growth, reach, and conversions as possible metrics, and its policy discusses cross-channel analytics and reporting. Those measures are useful only when interpreted in context: a larger follower count is not, by itself, evidence that an account is advancing an institutional goal.
- Reach: Whether intended audiences are seeing the content.
- Engagement: Whether people respond or interact in ways relevant to the post’s purpose.
- Audience growth: Whether the account is building a relevant audience over time, not merely adding followers.
- Conversions: Whether social activity contributes to a defined next step, such as visiting a resource or completing an institutionally relevant action.
Use platform-native data and institution-approved cross-channel reporting, document the period and context behind the numbers, and review performance on a cadence suited to the account’s goals. Use the findings to adjust content, channel choice, or workflow; do not present generic industry benchmarks as campus results.
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Quick Recap
A practical launch and review workflow
- Define the account: Write down its institutional purpose, audience, channel rationale, owner, and success measures.
- Get authorization: Follow the institution’s strategic review and account-creation process before opening a profile.
- Secure continuity: Assign authorized administrators, document roles and recovery procedures, and plan for staff transitions.
- Prepare operations: Set an editorial calendar, approval route, monitoring coverage, moderation approach, and escalation contacts.
- Review each post: Check accessibility, privacy, permissions, accuracy, and linked destinations before publishing.
- Use approved tools: Confirm software, access, and data practices with institutional reviewers.
- Assess outcomes: Review relevant metrics on a regular schedule and make changes when audience evidence or institutional priorities warrant them.
