I didn’t realize how old I am getting until I went to a seminar on “marketing in a world of social media” this week. Upon arrival, I guessed that the average age in the room was about 10 years below mine and prior to the presentation, I had proudly identified two people in my immediate vicinity who were definitely older than I.

About 10 minutes into the first presentation, I bumped down the average age another 5 years because, while I had turned off my phone and was listening intently, at least half of the audience was typing, texting, tweeting, emailing and checking their various social media outlets. The real kicker for me was the two persons I knew were older than I. Person #1’s cell phone began ringing and I could hear the “kids” in the room saying to themselves “do you want me to show you how you can use ‘silent’ as a ringtone?”. Showing an even more Jurassic look on life was Person #2 who was taking notes with (I am not making this up) a pencil and paper.

I found that I was in the minority in understanding most of the acronyms being used (SEO, ROI, LTV, etc.) by the presenters, but my face definitely started to glaze over once the discussions moved into things like Twitter, Pinterest, vines and blogs. I am still trying to understand why people find all this interesting and how they find the time looking for “infotainment” but we now have a very active Facebook page, a growing Twitter following and (very soon) a blog so I guess I just need to embrace it and go with wherever the future takes us with social media.

I realize now that I was once one of those 20-somethings who was pushing the old guys at the school to “get into the 21st century”. The same look I give when someone suggests we have a Twitter account is the look Mr. Philbrook gave me when I boldly declared that Mentor needed a website about 20 years ago. When I get excited about the fact that we can send video/photo and news information instantaneously to our parents today via Facebook and Twitter, I remember how Mr. Philbrook was just as giddy when I showed him what I had designed for the home page of our first website (pictured…and you do NOT need the current version of Flash to view it!). It makes me feel like a dinosaur but even they had a great run for millions of years.

Chris Starkey
Administrative Principal
Mentor College / TEAM School