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Module 5 Assignment

Purpose

        The Board of Queen’s Radio CHFHT 101.9FM (CFRC) has requested an analysis and report describing how the radio station presently benefits from social media and how its social media presence could be improved. The report will identify what the station currently does effectively (or ineffectively) in terms of its social media presence, then outline suggestions for enhancements. It will also include recommendations on audience identification and opportunities for increasing listenership and developing brand recognition.

Executive Summary

        Although stakeholder consultation was not included within the scope of this project, in researching CFRC’s history, community involvement, and online presence, it was clear that the station is highly regarded. It has many allies among business owners and entertainers, both locally and nationally. Many prominent media personalities, like the CBC’s Shelagh Rogers, are CFRC alumni.

CFRC has a professionally-produced website which features fresh content. It also conducts outreach via the following social media platforms: Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn, and YouTube. Of these platforms, CFRC is only actively engaged in managing its Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram accounts. In spite of that, CFRC has the highest possible page ranking on the Google search engine, thanks to its long history of web presence and its activity across several social media platforms.

        This report found that the main opportunities for improving social media presence, listenership and brand recognition are:

1. CFRC could achieve better brand recognition and listener engagement off campus by using one of its many logos consistently or by rebranding the station with a new logo selected through a competition.

2. CFRC should become more interactive on social media accounts that it is currently actively managing.

3. CFRC needs to revamp its Instagram account to suit a younger demographic.

4. CFRC should revive its YouTube channel since YouTube provides free publicity and can be very lucrative in terms of ad revenue.

5. CFRC should strive for a far greater presence on LinkedIn, given its 96-year history.

6. CFRC should pay attention to the types of posts that gain the most likes, then tailor its posts to suit user preferences.

7. CFRC’s website has several formatting issues that need to be addressed. Most importantly, links to all of its social media platforms should be displayed prominently on its home page.  

Introduction

CFRC is a local campus radio station at Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario, that mainly serves the university and the greater Kingston community. The station has one of the longest radio histories in the world, having been continually in operation since 1922 (Queen’s Archives 2012). According to the CFRC website, they offer diverse music and spoken word programming 24/7. They also provide free broadcast skills training and experience to members of the community (CFRC 2018). The station has a reputation for being an early adopter of technology, such as the internet and social media. In recent years, social media has become an effective and inexpensive marketing tool, so it has become important for CFRC to not only to be present on social media platforms, but also to be active and successful on them as well. This is especially vital as it tries to make up for shortfalls in its operating budget through fundraising efforts.

Methods

Each researcher conducted an independent investigation of CFRC’s use of social media platforms, including their website, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube and LinkedIn accounts.  The findings of the analysis were pooled, then presented in a results section which includes a table listing the present strengths and weaknesses of each social media platform. Recommendations for improvement were then provided in the areas of audience identification, brand recognition, and increased listenership/affiliation.

Results

Audience Identification

As a radio station, CFRC receives regular reports of listener demographics from Numeris (formerly called the Bureau of Broadcast Measurement Canada). Numeris compiles and distributes viewership and listenership numbers for television and radio broadcasters in Canada (Powell 2014). The latest listenership statistics show that CFRC has 69,000 active listeners, 45% of whom are aged 25 to 45. There are also an estimated 10,000 social media followers, across platforms, over 60% of whom are aged 25 to 65. This is a surprisingly old demographic considering that CFRC 101.9FM is a campus radio station and the majority of Queen’s students are aged 18 to 22. This younger demographic is an important target market for growth in listenership.

Listeners can tune in to CFRC 101.9 FM over CFRC’s entire broadcast range, which is a 16Km radius of Queen’s University in Kingston (Theodric Technologies 2019). They can also tune in worldwide via the internet at https://www.cfrc.ca/listen or via smartphone apps. CFRC’s audience is therefore potentially worldwide, especially for its foreign language programming.

CFRC’s Broadcast Range. Theodric Technologies (2019)

Outreach and Fundraising

CFRC 101.9FM is famed for its highly effective “Live During the Drive” fundraising efforts. Its campaigns regularly raise over $25,000 annually for station operations. CFRC has also been highly successful in its lobbying efforts to have graduate, professional and undergraduate students approve its optional ancillary fundraising fees.

CFRC has excellent radio content. The station also benefits from its reputation as the oldest campus radio station in Canada (Department of Marketing, Queen’s University 2019). It has numerous allies who are prominent journalists, entertainers, and community members; for instance, Queen’s University’s President Daniel Woolf. CFRC recently publicized a live AMS retirement roast of Dr. Woolfe over its social media channels (Appendix 1). CFRC also has close connections with local musicians, business owners, and club owners, which helps it generate advertising and fundraising revenue; for example, both The Screening Room and The Mansion hold CFRC fundraising events annually.

Brand Recognition

CFRC 101.9FM uses several different versions of its logo over its social media platforms. It could increase its brand recognition by consistently and exclusively using the same logo. It could either choose from an existing logo or gain publicity and audience engagement by holding a contest for listeners to design a new logo. Ideally, the logo should be colourful, like its tricolour logo, which would facilitate the design of a more visually appealing website and social media accounts.

Social Media Platforms:

CFRC’s Website(https://www.cfrc.ca/)

Strengths

Weaknesses

●      The banner on the home page includes a description of CFRC, instead of just the logo.

●      The button for users to listen to broadcasts is easy to find at the top right of the home page.

●      The menu is easy to follow.

●      The Contact Us page includes the email addresses of actual staff members.

●      CFRC’s most recent news and event items scroll horizontally across the home screen in a large ad banner.

●      The home page also includes a prominent “Donate” button and links to “About”, “Listen”, “Apply to Volunteer”, “Ads and Sponsorship” and “Podcasts”.

●      Given the graphic design skills of CFRC’s staff, the website is not as visually impactful and colourful as it could be. The banner is very underwhelming and is partly hidden by the scrolling news and event items.

●      Links for user sign-ins to their social media accounts at the top right of the home page are easily mistaken for CFRC’s own social media links.

●      CFRC’s social media links are down at the bottom right of the home page, so a user has to scroll to get to them. Although Facebook and Twitter are linked from the website’s home page, the links are tiny and very hard to see.

●      The donate button is black and white, so it blends in with the logo.

●      The bottom of the home page appears disorganized below the “Welcome” image.

●      Most of the site’s pages have some formatting issues, with content on some pages starting further below the headings then it should.

LinkedInhttps://ca.linkedin.com/company/cfrc-radio

Strengths

Weaknesses

●      CFRC has a LinkedIn profile. Many non-profit campus organizations do not.

●      CFRC posts too infrequently. The most recent post was three months ago.

●      CFRC’s LinkedIn page says they have 2 to 10 employees/volunteers and are connected with 19 employees.  This suggests that their LinkedIn information is not up to date.

●      CFRC has only 69 connections, even though it has been operating since 1922. It must, therefore, have 100s of former volunteers who are not yet connected. It is missing out on a large pool of potential donors and supporters.

Facebook(https://www.facebook.com/cfrcradio)

Strengths

Weaknesses

●      CFRC’s Facebook presence has improved in the past year. It now posts interesting information and appealing photos to FaceBook approximately every two days.

●      It is very responsive, replying to messages within two days.

●      Posts draw attention to community events and other groups on campus. They typically feature information about upcoming broadcasts.

●      Some posts have showcased how students have used CFRC programming skills in their courses.

●      CFRC’s Facebook page is liked by only 3,730 people, which is relatively few followers, given that Queen’s has about current 24,000 students and 120,000 alumni on LinkedIn alone.

●      CFRC still posts too infrequently. As well, the posts are mainly informational, rather than interactional. Apart from the fundraising drive period, very little interaction is elicited from audience members; for instance, there is no evidence of “like and share the page” contests to increase the number of followers.

Twitter(http://twitter.com/CFRC)

Strengths

Weaknesses

●      There is a pinned tweet at the top of the account detailing how users can listen to CFRC.

●      CFRC has been active on Twitter since 2009, with 7,079 followers.

●      It has a very active twitter feed with about 7 to 10 mainly original tweets daily.

●      CFRC is responsive in replying to tweets.

●      The Twitter feed includes some of the same content as Facebook, but in a different format.

●      CFRC uses Twitter to advertise other services like podcasts or workshops, and other accounts like @ygkarts.

●      In the past month, CFRC’s most popular tweets by far were one on a Gaels men’s hockey playoff game with 31 likes and 7 retweets and one describing a student training session for an engineering course with 23 likes and 4 retweets. A post on how to make podcasts attracted 8 likes. CFRC’s new movie review tweets were also liked by 6 to 8 people.

●      The banner is bold, colourful and grabs the user’s attention. Including original hashtags in the banner creates more traction for CFRC and generates more opportunities to interact with the audience.

●      In spite of CFRC’s interesting, original tweets, very little audience interaction is apparent. There are many tweets with no likes or retweets. A few tweets were retweeted once and liked up to four times.

●      Most tweets from CFRC simply promote upcoming events. There is little attempt to interact with the audience to obtain feedback.

YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/user/CFRC1019)

Strengths

Weaknesses

●      The initial channel content was of very high quality, for instance, a video on “CFRC - the Student Experience” (Appendix 2) and several videos of the Wolfe Island Music Festival.

●      CFRC’s YouTube channel is presently a lost opportunity, with only 85 subscribers.

●      It seems to have been abandoned. No one has uploaded a video to the channel since 2015.

Instagram(https://www.instagram.com/cfrcradio/?hl=en)

Strengths

Weaknesses

●      CFRC’s Instagram posts can be attractive and colourful.

●      Considering the young demographic of its audience, CFRC has very few Instagram followers (1,293).

●      The account banner is relatively dull and unappealing.

●      CFRC also posts infrequently, with days going by between posts.

●      The posts with the most likes in the past month were similar to its most-liked tweets, including a post about a student training session for an engineering course with 31 likes.

●      Many posts lacked depth and failed to grab attention as they were not aesthetically pleasing to “Instagram standards”.

●      Relatively few posts featured photographs of people.

Discussion

Overall, CFRC has an impressive web presence. Its effectiveness is demonstrated by its high page ranking on the Google search engine, which can be attributed to the posting of fresh content to its website regularly and to its social media activity on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Facebook and Twitter are the most popular platforms among CFRC’s largest listener demographic, which is why CFRC tends to promote itself on these social media apps. Since the majority of CFRC’s audience members have a Facebook account, it is potentially very effective to post and promote content on Facebook than on any other social media platform.  CFRC’s use of Twitter shows that its staff understands how to target and promote its content to a younger demographic as well.  By tweeting about upcoming events and even using memes to gain attention, CFRC manages to retain its loyal Twitter followers. CFRC is active on Instagram too, but it does not appear to tailor its Instagram content to the undergraduate student demographics, which is a largely untapped donor base and a market for CFRC’s advertisers. To improve its connection with undergraduate students, CFRC should focus on its Instagram account more. It should also revive its abandoned YouTube channel. YouTube is an extremely influential social media website, which CFRC could use to draw in more listeners among undergraduate students as well as audiences well beyond the Kingston community.  When it was actively being updated, CFRC’s YouTube postings of videos from the Wolfe Island Music Festival could potentially have attracted new listeners from far outside the station’s usual listening audience, increasing its reach. If CFRC updated the look of its YouTube channel and began to post videos of live events like concerts and Gaels’ games, it would be able to earn more views and gain a lot of free publicity for the station. CFRC has also not been posting regularly on its LinkedIn page, so it does not have many connections.  Considering the size of its audience and that CFRC has been broadcasting since 1922, the number of connections it has should be far higher.

Recommendations

1. CFRC could achieve better brand recognition and listener engagement off campus by using one of its many logos consistently or by rebranding the station with a new logo selected through a competition. The latter option would likely generate more followers for its social media accounts.

2. CFRC could become more interactive on social media accounts that it is currently actively managing. This could be accomplished by conducting contests; for instance “like and share” contests on Facebook. It could also ask users controversial questions and run polls, rather than simply posting static information.

3. CFRC needs to revamp its Instagram account. Its main listener demographic is older than it should be, given its status as a campus radio station. Younger audience members tend to be Instagram users.

4. CFRC has virtually abandoned its YouTube channel. It needs to revive the YouTube channel since YouTube can provide free publicity. It can also be very lucrative in terms of ad revenue. YouTube is very popular with the younger demographic that CFRC needs to attract.

5. CFRC should also aim for a much greater presence on LinkedIn, given its over 96-year history. Every alumni programmer should be connected to it on LinkedIn, but few are. Considering how well established and wealthy some of its alumni are, this is a missed networking opportunity.

6. CFRC should pay attention to the types of posts that gain the most likes, then adjust its posts to suit user preferences. Posts pertaining to sports games and concerts are very popular. Two areas that show particular promise are the new movie review posts and posts about academic activities involving CFRC; for example, one Professor had her engineering students produce radio segments as a project for her course. More collaboration between the station and Professors would be very beneficial.

7. The website could easily be improved by adopting a more impactful colour scheme, similar to CFRC’s tricolour logo. The underwhelming home page banner and the largely black, white and grey page colour scheme are less than ideal. As well, only two links to CFRC’s social media platforms are displayed on the home page in a very obscure location. Links to all social media platforms should be promoted prominently. Also, on some of CFRC’s web pages, the text is grey rather than black, which is an accessibility problem. Finally, there are some minor page formatting issues which need to be addressed in order to present a uniformly professional web presence.

Bibliography

CFRC (2018).A Brief History of CFRC. Retrieved April 3, 2019, from https://www.cfrc.ca/history.

Department of Marketing, Queen’s University (2019). CFRC-FM Radio, Queen's Encyclopedia. Retrieved April 3, 2019 from www.queensu.ca/encyclopedia/c/cfrc-fm-radio.

Powell C. (June 25, 2014). BBM Canada rebrands as Numeris.Retrieved April 2, 2019, from http://marketingmag.ca/media/bbm-canada-rebrands-as-numeris-117814/.

Queen’s Archives (2012). 90 Years of Queen’s Radio. Retrieved April 3, 2019, from https://archives.queensu.ca/exhibits/cfrc.

Theodric Tecnologies (2019). Radio Locator - Predicted Broadcast Area for CFRC 101.9FM.  Retrieved April 1, 2019, from https://radio-locator.com/info/CFRC-FM.

Wikimedia Foundation Inc. (March 6, 2019). CFRC-FM. Retrieved April 2, 2019, from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CFRC-FM

Appendices

1. Queen’s AMS (April 1, 2019). Roast of Daniel Woolf. Retrieved April 3, 2019, from https://www.facebook.com/queensams/videos/843273469352065/?t=0

2. CFRC (2013). CFRC - The Student Experience. CFRC YouTube Channel. Retrieved April 3, 2019, from https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=3&v=1TcC-2F1oGs

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Assessment of CFRC’s use of Social Media

Barbara de Haas, Anastasia Jack, Kate DuQuesnay

Tables of Contents

Abstract/Synopsis 

Introduction 

Methodology

Results 

Discussion 

Conclusion/Recommendation 

References/Bibliography 

Appendices 

Abstract/Synopsis

        Besides their own website, CFRC exists on the following social media platforms: Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, Snapchat.  Of these social media platforms, CFRC is only actively social on the big three of Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.

Introduction

CFRC is a local campus radio station at Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario.  The station has one of the longest radio histories in the world and remains in operation at the present time and serves Queen's University and the greater Kingston community.  They are currently active on some social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and so we researched CFRC’s social media platforms and how it’s presence on each platform is effective or ineffective.  Since social media has become such a strong marketing tool today, it is important for an organization to be active on these platforms but also be successful on them as well.  

Methodology

Each researcher conducted their own research on each of CFRC’s use of social media platforms. This included their website, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, and Snapchat.  All research was w then collected and written into tables that compared its strengths and weaknesses.  Tables can be located in the Results section.

Results

CFRC Website

Strengths

Description of CFRC at the top of the page instead of just the logo

The button to listen is right at the top and easy to find

The menu is easy to follow

The Contact Us page has a lot of different ways to contact them with real people listed

CFRC has a recently updated website

Titles for its most recent news and event items scroll horizontally across the home screen

The home page also includes a prominent “donate” button and links to “About”, “Listen”, “Apply to Volunteer”, “Ads and Sponsorship” and “Podcasts”

Website’s design and colour is bold yet aesthetically pleasing

Nice, large ad banner in the middle of the main page that is perfect for advertising current and upcoming broadcasts

Weaknesses

The sign in to social media links; can be mistaken for being social media links at the top of the page.

Social media links are down at the bottom of the page so have to scroll to get to them.

The donate button doesn't instantly grab your attention and blends in with the logo

Although Facebook and Instagram are linked from the website’s home page, the links are tiny and very hard to see

The bottom of the home page is disorganized below the “Welcome” image

The site pages have some formatting issues with content on some pages starting further below the headings then it should

Given the graphic design skills of CFRC’s staff, the website is not as visually impactful as it could be

The promotion in the main ad banner is limited and what is being promoted does not grab any attention.

Facebook

Strengths

They post regularly with catchy information and appealing photos.

They draw attention to other groups on campus and other events

They showcase how students are using their services in their courses

They are responsive; look to be replying to messages within a day.

CFRC’s Facebook presence has improved in the past year. It now posts about every two days

Posts typically involve local events, upcoming broadcasts, and requests for volunteers

Weaknesses

It would have been great to put a face to who works there or who is posting content

CFRC’s Facebook page is liked by only 3,730, which is relatively a few followers given that Queen’s has about 24,000 students and 120,000 alumni on Linked In alone

For years CFRC was almost inactive on Facebook. As well, whoever was managing the account would often approve posts too late, sometimes even after a broadcast had occurred

CFRC still posts too infrequently. As well, the posts are mainly informational, rather than interactional. Apart from the fundraising drive period, very little interaction is elicited from audience members

Twitter

Strengths

Pinned tweet detailing how to listen to CFRC always at the top.

They talk about some of the same content as on Facebook but in a different way or using different words, and they have different content as well.

They advertise other services like podcasts or workshops, such as for @ygkarts.

They are responsive when it comes to replying to tweets

CFRC has been active on Twitter since 2009, with 7,079 followers

It has a very active twitter feed with about 7 to 10 mainly original tweets daily

Banner is bold and colourful and grabs your attention

Including original hashtags in the banner creates more traction for CFRC and creates more opportunities to interact with the audience

Weaknesses

In spite of its interesting, original tweets, very little audience interaction is apparent

There are many tweets with no likes or retweets. A few tweets were retweeted once and liked up to four times

In the past month, CFRC’s most popular tweets by far were one on a Gaels men’s hockey playoff game with 31 likes and 7 retweets and one describing a student training session for an engineering course with 23 likes and 4 retweets. A post on how to make podcasts attracted 8 likes. CFRC’s new movie review tweets were also liked by 6 to 8 people.

Most tweets from CFRC are to just promote upcoming events, no interaction with the audience to get feedback

Instagram

Strengths

CFRC’s Instagram posts are attractive and colourful

Weaknesses

Considering the young demographic of its audience, CFRC has very few Instagram followers (1,289)

It also posts infrequently, with days going by without a post

The posts with the most likes in the past month were similar to its most-liked tweets, including a Gaels sports post with 11 likes and a post about a student training session for an engineering course with 31 likes

All posts lack depth and fail to grab attention as they are not aesthetically pleasing to “Instagram standards”

General

Strengths

They use the same logo on the website, Facebook and Twitter.

Weaknesses

They have a slightly different description of CFRC on each social platform.

Discussion

Based on the research, CFRC manages to remain active on its social media platforms of Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.  These platforms are the most popularly amongst the targeted audience, which is why CFRC tends to promote itself on these social media apps.  One popular social media app that CFRC should look into improving is its YouTube page.  YouTube is one of the most influential social media websites where you can post your content and draw in more views from a larger audience of people beyond students and the Kingston community.  If CFRC updated the look of their YouTube page and began to frequently posts and updates the videos on their YouTube page of their recent broadcasts, they would be able to earn more views and gain more attention.

Conclusion/Recommendations

        While CFRC’s website has just recently updated, it still lacks fluidity and attention which makes it ineffective.  CFRC’s use of its Facebook page is the most effective.  Since the majority of the audience of CFRC have a Facebook account, it is simply easier to post and promote on Facebook than any other social media platform.  However, their use of Twitter shows that they understand how to target and promote to a younger demographic.  By tweeting out upcoming events and even using memes to gain attention, CFRC manages to maintain its followers on Twitter to keep supporting.  To further target younger audiences or gain newer viewers, CFRC should look into updating its Instagram to be more aesthetically pleasing and update its YouTube page with its current broadcasts.

References or Bibliography

“CFRC-FM.” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 6 Mar. 2019, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CFRC-FM.

“Queen's Encyclopedia.” CFRC-FM Radio | Queen's Encyclopedia, www.queensu.ca/encyclopedia/c/cfrc-fm-radio.

Appendices

1.    https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=3&v=1TcC-2F1oGs

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Module 4 Assignment- Twitter Essay

Here is a basic overview of how search engines work- so you can better understand Search Engine Optimization or SEO is all about.

1. There are 130 million registered websites out there on the internet today.  People use search engines to help sort throughout most of it to find what we are looking for. 90% of internet users rely on them to find things. The most popular search engine is Google.

2. When searching something on Google, you get back a results page. 94% of people only click on results on the first page. Adjusting search terms is preferred over looking through subsequent result pages.

3. Of that first page, most users click on the “golden triangle” or the top three results. This is why optimizing your website for search engines, or #SEO is so important. If your website does not show up in the top 3 results or on the first page, you basically do not exist.

4.    Position on Google search pages is determined by page rank: every website has a ranking for particular search terms or keywords. However, keywords do not equal relevancy. Websites that were “backlinked” a lot AKA referred to by other websites were more likely to be relevant. This is how Google was born.

5.    Search engines today follow this model. They still look at the website’s keywords but rank your site's relevance on the number and quality of backlinks to it from other websites.

6.    Keywords let google see your website and know what it’s about. Backlinks let google trust your website to be relevant. Keywords are important because they tell Google you’re out there, but backlinks move your websites up the food chain.

7. These results are called organic/natural results. They are constantly changing based on what people actually do on the web.

8. Like there are two aspects to how search engines find and rank pages; there are two corresponding components to SEO: on-site component (optimize your website to contain keywords relevant to your website) and off-site SEO (generate backlinks to your website).

9. On-site examples: using words like sandals, California, ocean, beach, flip-flops, etc. if you sell sandals in California. Off-site examples: Articles, social media, blog posts, discussion boards. The more influential or legitimate your backlink is, the more effect it’s going to have on your search result rank.

10. SEO is essential to help you move to the top of relevant search results. SEO is the most effective way to increase traffic to your site because almost everyone relies on search engines to find things online.  

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XOXO, Chocolate

Welcome to the wonderful world of chocolate. Death by chocolate, anyone?

We want to introduce you to XOXO, some of the best chocolate you’ll find anywhere on the market. Fairly traded with Peruvian farmers in the Peruvian valley, our many flavours will not only bring joy to your taste buds but your wallet! Where else can you buy something so sweet that tastes so right?

Our Mission:

We believe in Farmers’ rights- no big factories here. Directly from your purchasing power to their hands, this is a revolution in chocolate! With three flavours sure to rock you, join us on an incredible journey.

XOXO’s mission is to improve the world by reinventing everyone’s favourite food- chocolate! From responsibly sourced ingredients to justice for farmers and processors, we do it the right way, every way. Every component is non-GMO, always real, and never artificial (no gluten, corn, or soy). We use real ingredients that are sustainably sourced and fair traded, so every bite of our chocolate tastes so good. We hope you will join us in making the world a better place- a place where you can enjoy your favourite treat knowing that your purchase contributes to this mission.

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Introducing Me

Hello fellow students,

My name is Anastasia, and I am a third-year English student at Queen’s University.  I stepped foot on Queen's three years ago, and boy do I wish I had some help during my first year.  Now that I am in my third year, I think I’ve gotten the hang of it and have some wise advice to share with my fellow Queen’s students.  After all, there is no better way for an English student to practice her writing then by creating a blog to sharing her life experiences with strangers.  Hopefully, this blog will help answer any lingering questions you may have when it comes to being a student at Queen’s.  

Going into my first year, I remember googling “what is it like being a Queen’s student” and “where to go out in Queen’s” when I was preparing to move from my hometown to Kingston.  I was nervous to move away from my parents and high school friends and to meet new people and start a new chapter of my life on my own.  I craved information about Queen’s and what this place had to offer but it was hard to find information that was accurate, up to date, and credible.  Most of the articles I found were either missing key information that I was looking for or extremely outdated.  How was I supposed to find the best nightclubs to hit up if the article was written ten years ago? Twitter, while an entertaining app for comedy, has a community that is too large to narrow down information in just Queen’s itself.  Facebook is too personal and private. However, Snapchat and Instagram prove to be a little helpful by carefully creeping the location of people’s posts, but there should be an option that is a lot less invasive.  Which is why I’m creating this blog, answering the questions that all Queen’s student share on an accessible platform that is quick and easy to read.

My goal in this blog is to share the essential information that all current and future Queen’s students need to know when being a Queen’s student.  Whether it’s moving to Kingston, your first year on campus, what it’s like to live in the student ghetto, where the hot places to go are, where the best (and cheapest) places to get food are, and anything in between.  If you have any suggestions or questions, don’t hesitate to send me an ask, and I will include it in my posts.  I want to know what you want to know! This blog is also a fun and safe environment for Queen’s students to read, learn and enjoy so please be kind of one another. 

Cha Gheill!

P.S. Here are some pictures I’ve taken over my three years here that all relate to some topics I will be talking about on this blog!

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Saturday’s are for writing, right? ☕️

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18th January 2019

I’m tired and ill and I have too many books to read.

Does anyone else think that camomile tea smells like hay?

ig: warmdayswillnevercease

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Friendly reminder - you’re not a full time professional athlete. you’re not a fashion icon. you’re not supposed to be perfect. Shitty grades happen and it doesn’t mean you’re not smart. So if you’re trying to balance studying, working, volunteering, exercising, learning languages, and expect to be a perfect multilingual Victoria Secret model with straight As, a job, and volunteer time, as well as being a good friend and making time for yourself, you’re gonna have a massive breakdown and fail. You don’t have to be perfect. Navigating into academia is hard. Nobody is asking you to be perfect. Results matter, sure, but effort is important and valuable as well. You’re learning.