Content Curation and Social Media Self Reflection

Since completing my undergraduate studies, I knew that furthering my education was an important next step in gaining better understanding of my responsibilities as a healthcare provider in Canada. My previous degree, a Bachelor of Science in Nursing, focused on solidifying my scientific knowledge, ethical judgement, and competencies specific to my profession as a Registered Nurse. So far during my graduate studies, MHST 601 Critical Foundations in Health Disciplines has opened my eyes to a broader view of health studies within the Canadian healthcare system. The course highlights the importance of efficient content and data curation, while also solidifying my professional identity. As a result, I’m nearing the end of my first semester with an array of different tools to assist in content curation of digital health information, as well as a completed ePortfolio and professional social media accounts. Each of these elements are extremely valuable as I navigate my career path within a dynamic and evolving healthcare system.

Content Curation

Initially, the term content curation was completely unfamiliar to me. Admittedly, I found the concept slightly intimidating and wasn’t sure where to begin. I began reading our course learning resources and researching on Google in efforts to better grasp the concept. I learned that content curation refers to the gathering, organizing, and sharing of valuable sources of information that relate to a specific topic of interest (Spout Social, n.d.). In my prior experience, I had only utilized Microsoft OneDrive and file folders to store important files, reports, and information. These tools allowed me to ensure quick access to documents both at work and remotely. Although, throughout this course I took a deeper dive into various tools to help further optimize my content curation skills.

Our first unit focused on inter-professional connectedness, where we were encouraged to seek our personal preferences in digital content curation. My professor highlighted Zotero in our course content, so I decided to look further into resource management software. Zotero is an amazing software that easily downloads onto your web browser, and allows you to quickly save and store webpages, journal articles and videos. I found this program very user friendly and crucial to my success so far in this course. The various sections of my course learnings are clearly identified in my Zotero library, along with organized information that is readily available to me with a click of a button. Likewise, Zotero has been vital in assisting with bibliographies and referencing sources in my assignments, as this program links directly to your Microsoft Word. In the future I plan to utilize Zotero further for group assignments as it allows you to share and access collections from other users.

Moreover, I began utilizing Microsoft OneNote to organize and share my course resources to my colleagues. Through OneNote, I organized my course modules and added specific pages to each section as needed. I find the app’s display clear and concise, and easily accessible to my colleagues via direct link through my forum discussion posts and ePortfolio. The primary challenge I faced with OneNote was the text formatting. I found it difficult to format references in APA style within the body of the document, which did become time consuming throughout the semester. Overall, both Zotero and OneNote allowed me to gather and share content seamlessly. I believe each program was crucial to my success so far and I will continue to utilize these tools in my future courses.

Social Media

Earlier in the semester, I reflected on my professional identity and my social media presence. At that time, I determined that my professional social identity was lacking, and I identified this as an area of improvement moving forward. This was made clear by a quick Google search of my name, where I found no relevant information about myself or my career. Previously, I only utilized social media to share photos and events amongst my closest friends and family. Throughout this course, I quickly realized the importance of utilizing professional social media accounts to easily share health information and advocate for patients in my field of interest. Likewise, it would allow me to solidify my connectedness with other healthcare professionals by leveraging my networking skills and gaining visibility as a leader in healthcare.

I began by developing an ePortfolio through Wix, which showcases my professional identity and history through personal education, training, professional organizations and relevant policies and legislations. I’m also able to share blog posts and digital health information resources related to my clinical interests via my Resources tab. Further, I created a professional X account (formerly known as Twitter) and LinkedIn to follow relevant healthcare organizations and promote networking amongst my classmates and colleagues. Each social networking account is accessible via social links on my ePortfolio. Through each of these social media tools, I believe that I’ve successfully elevated my professional identity, as well as improved my confidence in publicly showcasing my career as a healthcare professional.

Conclusion

Overall, this course has allowed me to gain new skills in content curation and organization through various tools. I’ve also successfully developed online platforms to share information regarding my professional identity and interests within the healthcare system. So far, it’s been a pleasure to post my curated content and blogs via my ePortfolio whilst following along on the content, various perspectives, and experiences of my fellow colleagues in this course. In our current era of social media platforms and ever-changing digital health information, these tools will continue to be invaluable throughout my future graduate courses and professional path.

References

Sprout Social. (n.d.). Content curation. https://sproutsocial.com/glossary/content-curation/#:~:text=Content%20curation%20is%20the%20act,well%2Dorganized%20and%20meaningful%20material