Social Media for School Leaders: Content Engagement Analysis of Secondary Schools’ Social Media (Facebook) Pages

Abstract

Social media is considered a relevant method of communication between Australian secondary schools and their various constituents. While there is a general awareness of the importance of communication with stakeholders, there is a lack of detailed research into the content of secondary school social media information and the relative frequency of released content to the schooling community. This study provides an understanding of how secondary schools communicate with their students and school community in the social media landscape as well as how students are portrayed by schools in their social media communications. Sixteen government secondary high schools Facebook pages were analyzed over a year period. The highest number of total posts and reactions from across all schools were general reminders/announcements, sports activities, wellbeing programs/presentations and student promotions. There was a statistically significant association between number of posts and reactions but not between student population and number of post or reactions. The study provides results showing what posts are highly communicated by schools and what posts are highly engaged with by the schooling community. In turn, this also provides insight into how students are portrayed by schools in their social media communication and how school administrators can manage their social media pages to ensure a variety of context is communicated.