What does your brand have to do with college persistence?

In my class, we spent the last few weeks learning about the concept of a "personal brand".  Students have gone through a variety of lessons and exercises designed to help them come to a greater realization of what attributes they possess as a student and a member of this community, and how to translate that into an intention about their future.  Just to make the context clear, these are high school students at a school with a college preparatory curriculum.

One of the activities was borrowed from the business world, asking students to perform a gap analysis.  In our version of gap analysis, students were asked to come up with five words that describe themselves.  They had to also ask ten people that know them to supply them with five words that describe the student.  Finally, the student would compare their self-created "profile" to the 50 words supplied by their friends and family.  A high level of agreement between those two sources of information suggests that the student's brand is strong, and the gap is minimal.  A high level of disagreement suggests just the opposite - that the world is not picking up what he is putting down.

A student in my class reports:

 5 words that describe me: Hardworking, focused, humble, leadership, dedicated

3 words that don’t describe me: athletic, creative, and humorous

So what does all this mean?  Why does a high school student need to think of himself as having a personal brand?  Shouldn't they be thinking about Calculus and AP European History?  The SAT comes to mind as well...

It's all about developing a sense of agency.  It's time for a student to start assuming greater control of their life and, in the process, their learning.  By starting to make obvious the identity they are creating by their behaviors, thoughts, actions, and efforts, students can begin to understand the agreement or discrepancy in how the world perceives them.  If we understand something, we are better equipped to take action.

In his gap analysis, he goes on to say:

There are some discrepancies between my overall brand identity and my brand image. While doing this survey I thought one of the top 5 words that describe me was being humble, but when I asked the ten people what traits described me, no one said humble. This doesn’t mean that I am not humble, but rather it means that I am not doing enough on my part to make people feel that way about me. 

 I do think it is important to address the gap, of people not right away thinking of me as humble. I feel so because being humble is a great trait to have and I don’t like to brag about my accomplishments or my luxuries.

 Some points of differences were that all of my family members perceived me as respectful, but on the contrary two of my classmates said that a trait that doesn’t define me is in fact being respectful. This may be due to the fact that I am more laid back and playful around my peers rather than when I am around my family members. To fix this gap I could make my behavior around everyone consistent and not let it depend on a certain group of people. Some points of similarity were that both my family members and peers thought I was smart and this could be due to the fact that I get good grades and I am very organized and responsible when it comes to my academics. In addition, many people also said that I am responsible and focused. This could also connect back to the academic field because I have found that balance where I know it's time to play and where it is time to be serious and take initiative. Overall, many of the people that I ask to list my traits shared points of parity and points of differences.

Pretty good stuff, right?

You can try this at home!  Write down five words that you feel describe you, and three positive traits that don't describe you.  Then ask ten people from all different facets of your life to give you five words they feel describe you, and three positive traits that don't describe you.  You can use a program like Wordle to make the analysis more visually appealing and dynamic.  If you put the 50 traits that you heard from others into the Wordle, it will give you a clear image of your most powerful characteristics - those that are most effectively being communicated to others.

We live in an age where information can travel the globe in a matter of seconds.  A post to Instagram or Twitter is a matter of public record and comment almost the moment you hit <send>.  College admissions personnel routinely Google applicants, checking their presence on social media and gathering information that tells the story behind the application.  My students, indeed all of us, are in control of what we put out there to the world.  The first step is realizing that we are in control.  The next step is understanding the message that we're sending.  With a sense of agency, we hope to be successful at the final step - ACTION.



It's always the right day to "do yourself proud, (and) be a leader".

Thanks for listening,

CK