Organizational Twitter: @ONUSports & @SpiritAirlines

Twitter is has been the most important tool to catch fire within the social media revolution over the last year. I believe that if you had asked the average organization or individual one year ago, if they would be on Twitter, the answer would likely be, no. Over the last twelve months, many users have learned how to use Twitter more effectively. Over the last week, I’ve observed two organizations that I follow and would like to offer some comments on their tweets.

As a student here at ONU, and one who knows a number of our student athletes, I follow @ONUSports. This week has been a big week, as not only students begin to wrap up our academic quarter, but also for many fall sports, they begin to enter postseasons and tournaments. Keeping followers up-to-date, @ONUSports does a nice job updating the status of award winning players, and updating tournament standings. The following are some tweets posted in the last week from @ONUSports.

Dan Otanicar earns ESPN the Magazin/CoSIDA First Team Academic All-District honors http://bit.ly/2heHHp

Men's Basketball has solid performance in 75-66 loss in exhibition game at NCAA Division I-foe Kent State http://bit.ly/24tRA2

Men's Basketball has solid performance in 75-66 loss in exhibition game at NCAA Division I-foe Kent State http://bit.ly/24tRA2

No. 6 Volleyball sweeps Mount Union in OAC Tournament Semifinals http://bit.ly/2oq0jx

No. 6 Volleyball wins fourth straight OAC Tournament Title with 3-2 win over No. 19 Heidelberg http://bit.ly/H7POA

As I look to utilize a networking opportunity in Orlando, which is quickly approaching in December, I am looking for a cheap airfare. I was told by a friend to check out Spirit Airlines. I have logged on to their website a few times, and liked what I saw. I figured with this assignment, I should see if they had a Twitter account. Sure enough they do. No later than the end of Thanksgiving break, I plan to make my plans final, and very likely that I will be making a seat reservation on Spirit Airlines. I find their tweets to be exactly what I would be looking for, as I am about to purchase a flight myself: all about saving money. Here are the tweets I read in the last week from Spirit Airlines.

Coupon clipping is cool! Why not use one when booking your flight? Spirit is offering $35 & $24 coupons*! Click here:http://bit.ly/2Wq0Yn

Take advantage of your Spirit's $24 Coupon*! Book today and save on your next flight. Hurry, this offer ends tonight.http://bit.ly/1iYCHl

Use our $35 and $24 coupons now to save big on your next flight. Find the coupon that works best for you and book now -http://bit.ly/3cs1uN

"Falling Fares" at Spirit! Watch our fares fall as we roll through autumn! Our fares are falling as low as $9* E/W

- http://bit.ly/p6FBn

Overall, I found the two organizations that I followed this past week to be very interesting to me personally, and fairly effective for their purpose. @ONUSports kept followers up-to-date as new news about our sports teams became available. @SpiritAirlines was effective in offering coupons to people searching for flights, while not bombarding with annoying tweets. Many companies can do too many in short periods of time. Spirit kept their tweets to at least twenty-four hours apart, so never read more than one a day.

Students In Free Enterprise Video

This video was created to help encourage students to become active in student organizations, and specifically Students In Free Enterprise.

Big School/Little School

Today, I had another experince that showed me a little bit of what going to a bigger school would have been like. I traveled north to Bowling Green State University where I got to watch a high school friend play football for Central Michigan University. 

There is something about that Division I environment, no matter how small the BGSU crowd was, that helps to get your adrenaline rushing. I think it could have been initiated by the fact that we had a fly over from the local military base! I seriously thought that the flyovers only happened during bowl games and NASCAR races! Maybe I need to pay a little more attention. Either way, what a way to start the game off!

Even though I would not change my decision about coming to ONU for anything, there are certain compromises that you have to make. Division I sports and the big city enviornment, are most likely the most significant. I will hopefully make up for the that latter by getting a job in a cool city in the next few months!

Pictures of the Week

Touchdown run and Marching Band at halftime

Heard on the Tundra: Tropical Tundra

Tropical Tundra? Really?

When I think of homecoming, I don't jump to the conclusion of breaking out my 6th grade-fad Hawaiian shirt, putting on a lei, and doing a hula dance. Don't get me wrong, homecoming is one of my favorite events on campus, but the theme this year? I think it might be a little weak. Who doesn't love a good use of a little alliteration? I'm just not a fan of the exaggeration.

Sounding negative on this year's theme, may be a result of the non-cooperative wheather we're having at the moment. Givin the fact that we live with frigid temperatures and snow for four to five months, I don't like having tricks played on me. Especially when it involves getting me in the mood for putting "my butt in a lawn chair, toes in the sand, not a worry in the world, a favorite beverage on the way" (a little edited Zac Brown, anyone?). Also, did I mention that my youngest brother is going on a visit this weekend to Flagler College? Yes, it would be the one in St. Augustine, Florida, where he will get to go to the beach between trips to the cafeteria and residence halls. (How ONU is even in competition with Flagler, on my brother's top schools, I don't know?!?)

For all the negativity and sarcasm I've provided in this post, I think I need to put a positive spin on this. Maybe the choice of a Tropical Tundra theme for homecoming, will give us all one last chance to dream about warm, sunny days until Week 8 of Spring Quarter. Yeah, that's it.

Needless to say, homecoming is always a blast. Seeing campus light up with activity from dawn, dusk, and most likely dawn again, is very exciting. Be safe, be well, and get leid!

Stuff you might miss

To all my seniors out there, there are some things I'm not going to miss about being in school. Here's a couple:
1. Homework - when you work, you get to go home and more or less do what you want. Not when we're in school. That's what makes summers so great. You may actually have some free time. Not the kind of free time you make when you should be doing homework.
2. Just forgot what number 2 was - Well I thought I had a list. Mainly homework is what I won't miss.

On that note, on our last year on campus, take time to do some things you won't ever do again. This summer, I started biking. Just riding a bike to ride. It was something I hadn't done since before getting my drivers license. You could kind of call it the Le Tour de Ada, but I don't think this is that impressive. But what I will say it has been fun visiting the grain towers north, south, east and west of Ada. Here are a list of villages/towns I've been on my bike this summer:

Ada
Alger
Dola
Dunkurk
Lafayette
Lima
McGuffey

I still have yet to make it to Kenton and back, but fully intend to ride there and north of Route 30 (not on the same ride of course) before it gets too cold outside. I think we all know that my window of opportunity is closing quickly.

I also intend of going to the Wilson Football Factory "garage sale" and getting some discount Ada merchandise on Saturday. I want a flawed piece of Ada, history. That's right, one of those discounted NFL footballs!

Overall, I'm just encouraging some exploration of Hardin County and the ONU area. Don't miss out on the things that make this area unique - whether or not you plan on coming back after graduation.

Welcome Back To My Blog!

Living in Ada, Ohio for the summer has its ups and downs.

Good: I'm taking full advantage of the rent I'm paying for the next year living in my house.
Bad: Not too many folks to hang out with all the time.
Good: Makes for great get-togethers when people do make it back!

Bad: Compared to living in Tennessee, the weather does not. (It didn't make it passed 75 on the thermometer this weekend.) Jeans are only considered appropriate attire during the summer on casual Fridays; not for lounging around the house or playing cornhole outside.

Good: I have a great internship, providing me with great experience!
Bad: I'm paying way too much for the minimum number of credit hours to a fantastic institution that is providing nothing in return (other than confirming my internship).

The list could go on but I'll leave it at that for now. As for the retitling of my blog, it stands true: You know you live in Ada or the summer when you start to blog. When my current roommates leave for home on the weekends, I have plenty of quiet time which gives me time to think about "stuff" and generate ideas. One thought is to share some with you. Hopefully I'll stick to my plan, and provide entertaining as well as insightful posts.