A Digital Spring-Clean and Favorite #ArtsEdTech Things

http://rss.artsusa.org/~r/afta/blog/~3/QhJOWDShFdE/

Jessica Wilt

It’s my favorite time of year – spring is here! The season of rebirth and awakening is finally upon us. We shed our layers, watch everything and everyone come back to life, spring-clean our nests, update our calendar with upcoming culminating events and pay our taxes too.

As part of my annual tax prep, a digital spring-clean ensues. Every year I set aside some time (less than an hour every few days for about a week) to comb through the previous year’s email. I move important messages and archive them in labeled folders; Google Drive is awesome for this task.

Then delete, delete, delete.

Time consuming? Yes! Exhilarating? Heck yes! I feel so much lighter and more organized. Plus, I always find a few surprises hiding in my inbox: people to reconnect with, project related info I should hold onto, an important article, an innovative idea or two. I also clean up and organize apps I use regularly on my smart devices and delete the ones I don’t use, leaving room for extra storage.

Unsubscribe

While I’m at it, I take a moment to unsubscribe from email list serves, blogs and anything else where I have lost interest in the content or mysteriously added to a list. These are emails you never read and instantly delete from your inbox. Reduce email anxiety and unsubscribe!

Unfriend

Next comes the social media cleanse. On Facebook I update friends and acquaintance lists. Not every post you share is appropriate for every Facebook “friend” that follows you. Then, I unfriend profiles that aren’t an active part of my community anymore. As I get older, I’m realizing I have a lot more acquaintances than friends and don’t care who I offend by clicking unfriend.

Unfollow

On Twitter, I unfollow handles that are inactive (haven’t tweeted since 2013 or 2014), no longer provide relevant information I’m interested in, or people I’m not interacting with. There are also third-party sites that will do the dirty work for you. Creating Twitter handle lists by category like “artsed” or “EdTech” can be a great organizational tool as well. It’s amazing how much more valuable content appears in your Twitter feed when it is clean.

Speaking of lists…

People often reach out to me for arts education, social media, and technology resources I follow. I thought it might be helpful to curate a list of people and organizations that inspire and inform my work within the ArtsEdTechNYC community, a platform I founded two years ago in New York City for artists, educators, entrepreneurs and technology enthusiasts.

So while you’re doing all of that digital spring-cleaning, make room for all these new people and places to explore! Feel free to add more of your favorites in the comment section below or just tweet me: @JessicaLWilt

Movers and Shakers (People)

Steven W. Anderson: @web20classroom

Blog Founder, Web20Classroom.org

Guarav Mike Bawa: @GuaravMikeBawa

Director of Marketing & Communications, Baruch College

Ethan R. Clark: @clarkethan

Manager, Arts in Education National PTA

David Dombrosky: @DDombrosky

Arts Management and Technology Professional

Seth Godin: @SethGodin

Best Selling Author and Blogger

Mark Guay: @MarkWGuay