The Catholic School Leaders Podcast

10 Laura Tierney
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[00:00:00] K.

Cool. All right. Uh, this is our podcast with Laura Tierney, founder of the Social

Welcome to the Catholic School Leaders Podcast. My name is John Mahalio, your host, founder, and president of Elementary Advancement Solutions. Today, it's my pleasure to have Laura Tierney with us. She's the founder and CEO of the Social Institute, which is empowering students with their role model to navigate social media and technology in positive, high character ways.

Within two years, her team's unique gamified social media curriculum, co created with over 50, 000 students, has been touted as the gold standard in the country. Their positive, student led approach has been applauded by Melinda Gates on Twitter and featured by the Washington Post, NPR, and USA Today. In 2018, Laura received the Triangle Business Journal's 40 Under 40 Award.

In 2022, she was named a finalist. in the EdTech Leadership Award, [00:01:00] which recognizes leaders for outstanding contributions in transforming education through technology to enrich lives of the learners everywhere. Laura is an unshakable optimist, competitive athlete at heart. She's a graduate of Duke University and became a four time All American, two time captain, and Duke Athlete of the Decade for field hockey.

She played for the U. S. Junior National Team, representing her country at home and abroad. Today, Laura plays on behalf of students to equip them with the skills and values that embody their daily digital needs. Through her work and passion, students now have the chance to win, at the world's largest game, social media.

Laura, welcome!

John, thanks so much for having me. I was, have you ever been a sports announcer? That was one of the coolest announcements of the sports background I have heard.

there it is. So, sports announcers out there, if anybody's looking for one, I guess now I've got something to fall back on there,

so. it's great to have you with us. I know you and I have, [00:02:00] spent some time together in the past when I was a principal of the school, and I know the amazing work that you're doing, so it's so great to have you here and share some of your knowledge and insight with schools all over the country and all over the world,

Well, thanks so much for having me. The Social Institute, we've been around for eight years now, but you, and, Your educator team was with us from the very early days, so it's great to reconnect and social media has evolved so much since then,

Just a little bit.

And I think if we listen to this in 10 years, the things that we'll be talking about in 10 years will be even different than we're looking at nowadays. MySpace anyone, right? so I think when people hear the term social media, it sends people running. Like it automatically gets everybody going, oh.

Yet your company, and you personally, have taken that, wait a minute, not so fast. Walk us through the mindset of why you embrace this challenging topic.

is so easy to take a scare and restrict approach to social media. You look at the [00:03:00] headlines in the news and you see negative incident after negative incident and maybe educators too when they are in their principal's office. I think it's so important for all of us to keep in mind that social media, it is also how students are social period.

And it's not going away. We're using group chats to connect with each other, to study with each other when we're students. And then the more that. Us as adults, as educators and parents, the more that we can empower and equip the students rather than scare and restrict, it is a, it is a life lesson that will continue to support them, well after they graduate.

And I think that's something right there that you're now running ahead with because the chances that a student or an adult has a social media account is probably really really high, okay? It's it's [00:04:00] I don't want to say a hundred percent, but it's probably gonna be in the in the high 90s Okay And so the things that we can prepare these kids for in terms of getting them ready to have that social media account You know to me I always compared to driving a car We give the kids all these hours behind the wheel But then we just give them a social media account and go hey, good luck to you there

That's right. One phrase that we lean on a lot at the Social Institute is this idea that kids can't be what they can't see. And. Adults are right there using social media and the more that we could model what it's like to strike a balance or post based on your core values and your character or protect your privacy these are all skills that the more we model them positively, I think the more it can also rub off on, our children.

Yeah. And, and I think that leads into, you teach kids how to win at social media, okay? and when you think about it, if used the right way, social media can be a topic that helps you [00:05:00] promote yourself. It can help you promote your business, your school yourself, if you're a, a, a student athlete or a, a musician who's looking to go to college or something like that in a very modest way.

So what's the first step that schools need to take in order to do this?

Well, the first step, I encourage principals, assistant principals, teachers, is to really reflect on their mission as a school, and often, most schools, right, are anchored into this idea of educating the whole student, preparing students for the life that they're going to go on to live after they graduate too, and social media is, One of the biggest influences on our lives today.

And so the more that you think about and attach this education to your, strategic plan, your mission as a school, it helps anchor it, into why you get out of bed every

morning as an educator.

And it's not going away.

[00:06:00] It's not, it's not going away. And so when you think about how do you embed this education in an ongoing way, right, you know this well, like repetition is the mother of learning.

And so it's not about a one and done presentation at the school, but it's really weaving it into the fabric of your school schedule, no different than you might approach learning about math or learning about science.

No, I, I agree with that totally. And I think schools want to win at social media, but sometimes we, as you, we talked about earlier, we only see the bad things that happen. We only get the unfortunately 99 times out of 100, when something social media comes into a principal's office, It's not for good things, okay?

And that's the bad news of it. We see things get nasty on social media or through texting. And a lot of times this happens after school hours. But when you look at what's on maybe a parent's social media page or things like that, It's learned somehow. How do you recommend schools attack this problem [00:07:00] when, we're seeing what's on a parent page or we're seeing what's on a older sibling's page or things like that, but yet we're trying to teach the kids the positive and how you can win at this.

Well, I found that there's an instinct that us adults have when we see something going wrong and it, and the instinct is to helicopter and hover over the students more and tighten our policies even more or restrict the devices even more. And, you can call that kind of like helicoptering and the one phrase that we use at the Social Institute is we recommend.

Parents and educators huddle instead of helicopter, like huddle with the students or huddle with your children and talk with them about these different scenarios that they have already encountered or might encounter one day. And if you can huddle instead of helicopter, huddling would be great. Involves open communication, right?

It involves [00:08:00] sharing positive situations that, or positive moves that you've had to make, and that huddling builds trust, right? It builds comradery and it ultimately builds a school culture in those moments where you're connecting and you are sharing how you're doing and there's positive peer influence that happens, and I'm sure you can.

Kind of relate to that, given all your experience in the classrooms and working with teachers, is that I think the more that we can inspire dialogue around this topic, and it helps open our eyes to how we are all in this together and you're never alone in what you're navigating. So, huddle, huddling versus helicoptering would be my, my go to move.

Absolutely. And then on a deeper dive, when we're huddling and communicating to make sure that we're communicating and not just talking to. Because there's a big difference between having that open dialogue and open communication and just being talked at. Which is, takes that lecturing [00:09:00] format, which then of course closes doors immediately.

I remember watching an educator huddle with their students about the topic of group chats and the drama that could come out of group chats. And I remember seeing the educator, they, they got the students together in a circle. And it was our, the room was already set up for this great discussion and the teacher did a beautiful thing.

And what they did was they just, they sat down. on a chair that was in the circle and they were on the same level as the students. And I think when you do that, you even send this message of, listen, I don't, I don't know more than you, I'm, I'm here to learn just as you are. And it creates a very open, safe space for students to connect.

And schools are now weaving this in. They are weaving this into homeroom, advisory leadership, programming, even core subjects like social studies and, and science. There's all these opportunities during the day, right? And what's important to the school [00:10:00] gets It's your time and attention and so schools are finding a way to weave it in and teachers are doing a great job getting on a student's level.

And I think that sometimes when, when, let's just call this what it is. Okay. 99 percent of the social media, the kids are probably no more than us. a 15 year old will probably know more about the newest social media trends than we as adults do. It's, it's okay. Okay. So when you, when you say that teacher sits down and says, listen, I'm in learning mode here as well.

It's, it's okay. And I think sometimes that scares us as educators to not be the experts to not be the person in the room that knows, The, the most about a particular topic

yeah. Well, I imagine you probably were in that position a few times

maybe

where

you, feel like it's a little bit of whack a mole you hear about a new app and you're like what's that and it's been around for like three months already with the students.

Yeah, that's that's about it. And, and they're, they're already way ahead of you on it. They're already moving on to it. And, and I, I remember, I'm, and I know this isn't exactly [00:11:00] social media, but I go back to my early times as a principal when I would say to the kids. Well, everybody put your email address here so that we can communicate that to you and the kids would go, We don't use email anymore.

We use, it's all texting now. Okay, so a lot of them didn't even have email addresses. And so, and I'm sure that's only gotten more expansive as we've gone, gone along.

Well, you Bring up a great point that teachers Right. We are in a position because we often know more about a certain subject than the students do. Right. We are our, our, our job is meant to teach than, the next generation about a topic we know about. And the tricky thing about social media and technology is that we, we haven't lived.

It to the extent students have, and it requires a high, high dosage of vulnerability because you're putting yourself in a situation to talk about something that you might not know more about than the students. And so teachers having [00:12:00] a, the gift and skill set of just being able to facilitate conversation.

How do you make a child who, Just woke up that morning and woke up to a bunch of messages and texts where they were being made fun of by other classmates. How do you create a safe space where you could have a discussion and have that student come away thinking, one, I'm not alone in what I'm navigating, and two, hear the positive moves I could make.

I could talk to someone, in my life and a trusted adult, but I, I do think teachers have. They're one of the greatest role models in students lives, and so they're in this awesome position to have these wonderful conversations with students, but it does require that vulnerability.

you bring up a point too that a student wakes up and they see They're part of a group thread, okay? I don't know, maybe there's sometimes two, three, 15, 25 people on a group text thread. [00:13:00] And things have not gone the way that they should. Maybe the, the, the, the per, the use of what we were looking for this text to be and what it has turned into are not necessarily there.

But I don't want to be uncool and say, hey, take me off of this thread, even though I see that it's going south or that maybe I'm being made fun of, or maybe, maybe somebody in the group is, is not being treated kindly. What's your advice to the parent out there or to the school out there when you're part of that group thread or when you're part of those that group communication that has clearly gone off the rails to A, protect yourself, but B, kind of protecting other people that are in that group that maybe are feeling helpless and that they can't defend themselves on those types of things.

What would your advice be to the steps that they can take to right that ship or to get themselves out of, out of trouble?

Sure, I mean it's a really popular scenario that we hear from the students that we brainstorm with and I always like to remind students and adults and [00:14:00] myself, because I'm in this as well, that in every situation there are transcripts. All these different positive moves we can make, and one of those positive moves is, huddling with an adult that you trust in your life to talk to him about what you're going through, and research out of Penn State shared that students want to talk with the parent or guardian in their life about what they're navigating online, but they worry their parent or guardian may overreact and confiscate maybe a device or say, you're not allowed to use that app anymore.

You're not allowed to talk with those friends. Look what they're doing to you. And I, I recommend to families just to, keep your cool and. When you're in that huddle and your child comes to you, that is an amazing opportunity to build even more trust with your child and to ask a lot of open ended questions and to really understand what they're [00:15:00] going through because group chat, drama, or anonymous accounts being created to hurt students the list goes on and on.

But if they know that they have someone steady in their life and they don't have to fear talking about these situations, that is a gift that that keeps on giving and it keeps the door open with your child. And so just something I think all of us parents, myself as a parent of two we, we can all remember.

Yeah, and I think that when you have those conversations, when we get into other conversations with our kids later on in life, it keeps those doors open for that trust to be there, which, which hopefully just provides them more opportunities for success. Now, for the parent out there whose kid might be at that age where they're asking, because of course, all of my friends have a social media account and, and so I want a social media account.

And I think you've kind of alluded to this, that you can play offense. Where you can play defense on this one. And to me the more we can stay on offense, the, the [00:16:00] better off we're going to be as parents, as schools, as educators. But honestly, what advice would you give to the parent or to the school who says, okay the kids are starting to want it, want these social media accounts before they're even opened, before they're even there.

How how do we make sure that we're keeping them safe? But then also once they're opened. What kind of steps should schools or parents be taking to make sure that everything is is safe? Because recognizing Once a student leaves the school grounds, there's maybe limits in terms of what they're allowed to do in terms of things But obviously if something carries over into the school then it now becomes a school issue so what would your advice be or your kind of your Thoughts to make sure that things get off on the right foot for opening a social media account,

sure. Well gosh, it's such a popular question we hear from parents and I can think of a three part answer to this one, two specific situations I want to share and then a third comment to tie it all together. It makes me think of, first, [00:17:00] From an educator perspective, many districts and schools are now investing in the yonder pouches or other device, other pouches where you lock up, technology for the day and then maybe you get it at the end of class or you get it at the end of the school day and then the, the second, thing I hear from parents is, well, the wait till eighth movement.

What about wait till eighth? Can I just wait till eighth to give them a device and or wait till eighth to give them a social media account? And those, those two examples they, they have a lot more in common than we think they do. And I would say, listen, I meet some 12 year olds who are incredibly thoughtful with their social media account that their parent allows them to have access to.

I've met some 16 year olds who I'm like, oh, we got to, we got to reel it in a little bit more. The more that I find parents and educators ease their students into technology. It builds this mental muscle so that it's not just, let's [00:18:00] just wait till eighth and then just give them a lot of access. It's like you're throwing them into the deep end of the pool and they don't have skill set to swim yet.

And the more that, that we can set up certain milestones. It helps them build that mental muscle. So one free resource that we have at thesocialinstitute. com is we created a classroom standards agreement and a family standards agreement so educators can sit down with their students to talk about what are the standards that we have for this classroom when it comes to how we approach not just using our devices but what.

websites we can access while we're in class? What's our standard for, having a culture of eyes up? And then same at home, how do, as families, how do we set these standards with our students, our children, and how do they evolve over time? And I think the more we can ease children into technology, that mental muscle builds, and they are able to [00:19:00] thoughtfully handle these trickier scenarios, they're going to navigate down their own.

And I mentioned before, I know I gave the example before about driving the car, and I always used to say that to families, that make sure when a kid turns a certain age, we put them out there on the roads and we make them earn so many hours when they have their permit and to feel comfortable about them driving and then we let them go take their driver's test and only then do we give them a license and Christmas morning rolls around and we put a new iPhone in a box and hand it to them and go, here, here's the keys to the world.

Good luck with everything. And, and there's that piece of things that's like, no, no, we, we have to teach our kids how to use. Those devices, just the same way we do as an automobile,

to keep

right. That's right. And that example you just shared like one framework our team uses is rookie varsity pro. So if you think about pro is like getting that having an iPhone and not having limits and you could use it however you want. back that [00:20:00] up a little bit and think about varsity as well.

Maybe there's a certain screen time settings and maybe you're not allowed to use it in certain places in the house. Like you can't go to your bedroom and close the door. And then Rookie, Rookie is, you don't have the iPhone yet and you might have a smartwatch that can only call a few people.

But as a family, I did, I challenge you to. Break things down into those three different milestones and remember that rookie varsity pro you don't jump into pro right away. You gotta hit those milestones in advance.

I think that hits the nail right on the head right there, in terms of easing things in. I think that's a great strategy. Now, you gave a link on the website, just so that people don't have to rewind, and, and, what was that again? The link on your, on the Social Institute for that contract again is?

It is the socialinstitute. com and we share a lot of our sources, our resources on social media as well. So you can find us there using social media for good.

Lots of great stuff on there. I know I've spent [00:21:00] some time on the site and our work together with everything like that. So let's talk about two pieces of things. First, I want to focus on the schools, and then I want to focus on some individual students. What are some of the biggest mistakes that you've seen schools make when it comes to social media with their students?

And what have you found to be successful in playing on offense to minimize the impact of those mistakes?

let me start this one by saying I know all of these mistakes also come with very positive intentions from 100%. Not being critical, but helping people learn, I

guess.

Yeah, that's right. And so, but the missteps I see schools taking is thinking a one and done presentation is going to equip students for the whole year round.

I see them investing in one to one devices and giving students the keys to the car, but not equipping them with the education at the same time. And I also see, again, investing in other tools like yonder pouches, but [00:22:00] again, not proactively also investing in the education. And policies, listen, they're great.

Every school needs policies to balance technology thoughtfully. But education. not only applies to the classroom, understanding how to use social media and technology, it follows them home, too. And we know that's where a lot of drama and incidents, can start and then come into the classroom.

So education, it, knows no boundaries. It can follow the children home, and that's a great thing. And so, how I see schools winning at this. ever evolving complex topic is one, they are being proactive about it and they're not playing whack a mole. They're not waiting for all these negative incidents to happen.

They're saying, how are we going to get ahead of the game? and by making that decision, I also see them partnering with parents and teachers, two of the greatest role models in a child's life. Right? And [00:23:00] so I imagine you could, think of initiatives that you've taken where you get both the teachers and the parents united towards a common goal.

It's a pretty powerful thing.

Yeah, and I think the start somewhere, okay? Recognizing this, as much as I hate to say it, when you're dealing with the social media animal might zig instead of zag, and thinking this is the way, and, but then learn from it. Okay? There are, unfortunately I wish we could say we got them all right, but unfortunately, sometimes in certain instances, they're learning moments.

We go, okay, while this happened and we did this and we should have done this instead, how do we make sure that doesn't ever happen again? Okay, or how do we make sure that we can put the steps in place that when this happens, we can more proactively deal with it? And so, yeah, I wish we could say we got 100 percent on our test score, but, but unfortunately, we know that that's just, that's the learning piece of things.

That's the learning piece of ourselves as leaders that we're, we're continually learning on things. Thanks.

Right, and I think it brings it back to what we were talking about earlier of just like high, high [00:24:00] dosage of, of vulnerability and, and compassion for yourself because every educator in the country is navigating this topic. So, you're not alone if you feel like you are playing whack a mole, but there is a, a way to be more proactive about this topic.

Well,

it doesn't exist is not going to be a winning option. That's when we talk about playing on offense versus defense, that's certainly not going to get a winning option. So when we talk about winning, you work with many, many, many students, okay? Because that's really the focus of your time, your work too, is to help students win at social media.

What are some examples of students winning at social media that you can provide or some things to maybe give Parents and schools some ideas that they can promote these things So that they can help their students win on the home front.

I can think of so many moments where students from kindergartners to 12th [00:25:00] graders are using technology positively. I can think of high school students that are playing to their, their core values and their interests so that, when time comes for college, they have a, a really thoughtful website or social media account that best represents their strengths and their interests.

I hear of Middle school students like John that are taking to social media to create positive change in their community. There was a sixth grader who noticed that in her, her school library. The school needed more books that represented, a diverse group of students and she worked with her mom to go to social media and help collect books, from the students throughout the school and in the community.

I know students who are being asked to send books. risque photos to a crush and they are shutting it down and saying, listen, I, I'm, I'm not okay with sending something like that. [00:26:00] Or some students just. block, the person they're talking to all together. So there are moments that are maybe a little high profile and they're making the news, but then there are all those little undercover positive moments every day that students are making.

And I, remind the students, like, when you make these positive moves, you're also not alone in doing that. That there are millions of students across the country that are doing this every day, and the more that we could put a spotlight on those positive moves, it just creates this force of positive peer influence.

and as schools as businesses We're building our brand with everything that we're doing on social media and for our students as individuals They're building their own individual brand as students from from the moment they jump on there to the moment. I'm even hearing of colleges and say, give us your social media accounts and your password so we can see what's going on on, on your on your accounts or things like that.

We're building our [00:27:00] brand for ourselves as individuals to help be the best version of ourselves that we can be.

The more you can have your core values align with what you share, I think that it's, it's so important. I remember sitting down with an 11th grade student and she said, Adults are so quick to put the word digital in front of everything.

Your digital footprint, your digital life, your, your digital this, your digital that. And the, the student was like, it's just all. It's like it's just our life. Like it's just our footprint. And the more I think we can empower students to just really like, Hey, who you are online is who you are offline. It's just, that's just all one in the same.

It's, it's a, it's a really powerful takeaway for students and adults.

as we wrap up here today, if you had one parting thought of wisdom to give to our schools. One parting wisdom to give to our students and one to [00:28:00] our parents out there. What would that be?

I think it would be something I would want to hear when I was 13 years old, which is, You're not alone in going through this on social media, and you get to control the controllable CTC, there's a lot of things that we can't control, we can't control as an educator, A disgruntled parent, coming maybe into our office as a teacher, there's a lot of things we can't control.

And my goodness, as students, there's a lot of things we can't control. But when it comes to the world of social media, we can control how we use technology, how we use our screen time settings, what we click send on. There's a lot of things that are within our control. We can control how much time we dedicate to social media education as a school system.

And so I would say keep an eye out for those moments and those opportunities you can control. And I think we could start to get this world of social media even more in check [00:29:00] and use it for good.

Awesome. And I can tell you firsthand the work that, that your organization does is, is top notch. And if anybody wanted to reach out to you to to work with the Social Institute, how would they get in touch with you?

We have so many free resources at thesocialinstitute. com, so you can reach out to our team there. And we are Working with an incredible community of schools across the nation, so we'd be thrilled to share some more resources.

Well, Laura, I want to thank you so much for your time today. Thank you so much for all that you're doing for our students to keep them safe and to help them win at the game of social media.

Thanks for having me, John. [00:30:00]