Design School Social Media Ranking 2014 Steve Diasio Ph.D. April 2014 The recent interest in design thinking has driven many students to seek out creative learning environment such as design schools as an alternative to business schools. Wall Street Journal has even professed, “Forget B-‐School, D-‐School is hot!” If design schools are gaining traction, how effective are design schools at engaging their audience through social media? The Design School Social Media Ranking 2014 indicates which schools are the most active using Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and YouTube. Results show Parsons the New School of Design with a distinct advantage in their social media reach. Parsons the New School of Design leads design schools in Twitter, Facebook and YouTube followings. Savannah College of Art and Design ranked 4th in the total social media ranking however leads all design schools in LinkedIn followers to drive its social media strategy. Internationally, the University of the Arts London ranked 6th in the total social media ranking. Below are the results of the Design School Social Media Ranking 2014 for Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and YouTube: If design schools are to continue their relevance in the educational marketplace their ability to attract, recruit, and communicate with future students, alumni, recruiters, and companies through social media seems to be a competency they are still learning themselves. Though social media is a component of the curriculum at many of the design schools, their own use of social media as a strategy to engage with an audience appears to be underutilized. For instance, the d. School at Stanford has a Facebook page but no likes on the page and it does not have its own YouTube channel. The d. School was the only school in the top 10 of the social media ranking that did not have a Facebook, LinkedIn, and YouTube on their website. The Design School Social Media Ranking methodology was based on overall reach and does not represent the activity or engagement from its followers and subscribers on each of the social media platforms. Each platform was given equal weight, however YouTube subscribers may consume video for an extended period of time, while LinkedIn followers may engage with the platform during job recruiting periods. Selected design schools included in the data collection had to be an independent institution offering a range of art and design degrees and have a minimum of 500 students enrolled to be considered for the ranking. Departments within university or colleges were not considered because of lack of data across the different social media platforms.
Design School
1 Parsons The New School for Design
YouTube
Total
34,815
71,571
6,188
18,801
131,375
4,990
54,091
8,889
845
68,815
0
52,181
5,185
0
57,366
4 Savannah College of Art and Design
16,146
18,027
13,220
2,546
49,939
5 Pratt Institute
14,932
28,561
5,044
691
49,228
6 University of the Arts London (UK)
12,152
29,094
6,859
834
48,939
7 Rhode Island School of Design
11,962
21,586
5,354
119
39,021
8,360
23,277
4,077
1,274
36,988
31,437
0
383
10 California College of the Arts
8,027
13,107
3,280
2,793
27,207
11 Royal College of Art (UK)
5,935
16,615
3,147
483
26,180
12 School of the Art Institute of Chicago
5,144
15,825
3,854
530
25,353
13 Maryland Institute College of Art
6,975
12,782
2,042
324
22,123
14 Ringling College of Art and Design**
5,655
11,260
2,106
345
19,366
15 Cooper Union
5,070
1,285
1,080
113
7,548
2 The Fashion Institute of Technology (US) 3 School of Visual Arts—New York City
8 Art Center College of Design d. School: Hasso Plattner Institute of 9 Design at Stanford*
* School has a youtube channel that is coupled with the university. **Only school not to have any social media on their website.
n/a
31,820