With social media, especially Facebook and Twitter, so pervasive in the lives of people it’s important that we look at what kind of affect it has on students. The Discipleship Training School (DTS), and other second level schools in Youth With A Mission (YWAM) have previously been completely immersive experiences mainly because of the difficulty and cost of communication.
Now, with easy communication tools like Facebook, Twitter, Skype, e-mail, etc. the YWAM DTS and other schools are not the isolated experience that it once was. Now it is possible for students to stay almost fully connected with friends and family back home while on their Discipleship Training School. The question we need to ask is how is that affecting the school experience and how can we as YWAM leaders use those tools to the advantage of our students?
With those thoughts and questions in mind please have a look at this infographic entitled “Is Social Media Ruining Students” and let us know your thoughts in the comments below the graphic:
Via: OnlineEducation.net
One thing that I think a lot of us “older” YWAMers need to do is not compare our DTS experience with the experience that people have doing a DTS now. Just because our Discipleship Training School was a certain way doesn’t mean that a DTS that operates now has to be the same.
When I did my Discipleship Training School the isolation was because communication was much more limited. It wasn’t “imposed” by the staff, it was simply because I was on the other side of the world and calling home to talk to family and friends was expensive.
We need to be careful as YWAM staff not to try to impose or replicate “our” DTS on our students. Every Disciple Training School is different, as it should be, and we need to look at how we can work with our students to make sure it’s the best experience possible for them to grow closer in their relationship with God.
Great link Bill. You inspired me to write a short piece that I’ve been thinking about for some time:
Facebook Ruined My Mind
[…] (HT Bill Hutchison) has produced this nice graphic that shows the result of a study on the effects of Social Media […]