This week, Facebook will be both a battleground and haven for Boston University students and alumni as they compete and cheer each other on in the "Facebook Takeover 2010."
From Sep. 27 to Oct. 1, the BU Alumni Association will encourage students to bond with former Terriers through its BU Alumni Facebook page by participating in a series of contests, commenting on the page's wall and "liking" its wall posts.
To participate, students must "like" the BUAA Page on Facebook and comment on Takeover posts, according to the BU Alumni Association website.
Kelly Cunningham, the BU director of Development 7 Alumni Communications, said the BUAA organized the Facebook Takeover event to encourage more student-alumni interaction.
"We hope that this will make the lives of students at BU better," she said. "The alumni get a window into the lives of students and how similar and different BU is from when they were here"
Students and alumni will be given the opportunity to win an iPad, gift cards to Starbucks, Barnes and Noble, Amazon.com, Dunkin' Donuts and personal training sessions at the Fitness and Recreation Center, according to the BUAA website.
One of the prizes even involves free laundry service.
"I was in college once, and I know that I would have been stoked to get free laundry," Cunningham said.
She said she wanted to encourage students to visit the BUAA website through Facebook Takeover Week.
"As part of the event, the BUAA is hosting mentoring sessions, interaction with career big shots who will help students get ahead in their career paths, personal training sessions, etc.," she said.
The event was instantly popular on Facebook, she said.
"We have had more than 80 people so far on only one question," she said. "The fan count for the BU Alumni page has gone up by 300 today."
The Takeover kicked off at 9 a.m. on Monday morning with the following question posed to the page's fans: "How would you use 10,000 convenience points?"
More than 52 students responded with a variety of ideas ranging from purchasing 20 pounds of Sour Patch Kids to BU gifts for low-income kids.
Alumni voted on the best response by commenting on the posts; they chose School of Hospitality Administration junior Dana Laustsen, a resident assistant, as the contest winner.
"[I will] create a floor event that my residents would actually go to: take them out to dinner at Noodle Street at no cost to them," Laustsen said. "It feels great to win $100 for my floor. I'm so excited and I know my floor is really going to get pumped about having a dinner out."
Laustsen said she thinks the Takover is a great way to "unite the current students at BU and the people who were here before us."
"I know the Alumni Association works hard to connect current and past students and this is an effective way to attract people," she said.
Veronica Ball, College of Communication "91, said she found out about the event from her Newsfeed on Facebook.
"So far I voted in the 10,000 convenience points contest," she said. "The students came up with some pretty clever ideas. I think the Takeover event is a creative way to encourage student-alumni interaction and so far it has been fun."
Other students and alumni agreed the event helped foster better student-alumni relationships.
"I definitely hope it runs in future years," said COM freshman Jon Christianson. "As a college student, I feel that I am practically licensed in the art of Facebook creeping. Since the BU Alum Association seemed to have put a lot of work in this, I figured I would give it a try. Acting silly on Facebook for a chance at free prizes was a no-brainer."
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