Throughout college, Facebook enables you to shamelessly stalk your crush, share pictures from last night’s raging party, and send passive aggressive notes to your roommate asking her to throw out her trash…again.

So who would have thought that the same social networking site that allows you to “poke” someone could also help advance your professional career? That is, if you know the content to include on it…and the things best left in a shoebox under your bed.

Hi there ThinkTalkers! My name is Connie and I am currently a senior Media Studies Major at CUA. During my time here at ThinkTalk, I will be blogging about my experiences and lessons learned in the work place in order to give you guys some tips and advice on what to expect and prepare for at your own internships.

Addicted to Facebook? Need to find ways to use your obsession for good? Read through the following tips on how to use your Facebook account to accomplish networking with possible employers and businesses.

When Facebook first became popular, I had no interest in the site especially since I was still all about my MySpace page. After being convinced by a friend to cross over into the Facebook realm, I was immediately addicted. The social networking site helped me keep in contact with all of my high school friends that I had to leave behind when college began, and also helped me meet new friends my new school.

Ever since the school year ended, I have been debating whether or not to delete my page. I kept thinking that I really do not need any extra distractions and after hearing horror stories of people not being hired based on potential employers searching for them on Facebook, I really thought it was time to say goodbye to Facebook. However, I recently came across an article at WebWorkDaily which quickly changed my mind on deleting my page. The article goes through 23 changes you can make to your page to make it workplace and business savvy. They are pretty simple changes that can help you actually get a job. I listed a few of the helpful tips below, but check out the article to see all 32!

"facebook" courtesy benstein via Flickr Creative Commons

Congratulations to Michael Agee for winning the Share Your Dream Internship contest and a new Flip video cam. His dream internship is to work as an assistant animator for Disney, Marvel Comics or DC Comics so he can learn how professionals put together stories. Hopefully, his new Flip video camera can help. Or he can just use it to film his roommates' most embarrassing moments and post them on YouTube to get a million views and become famous.

Our goal at ThinkTalk is to help you land great internships and even better careers. In order to bring you the information you need, we want to find out what kinds of internships you would love to get. What is your dream internship?

ThinkTalk is running a Facebook contest from 7 am on Tuesday, February 23 through 7 pm on Thursday, February 25 (EST).One lucky grand prize winner will win a Flip video camera!

Here's how it works:

• First off, in order to participate in this contest you must a) be a fan of the ThinkTalk Facebook page and b)be a student at an accredited institution of higher learning (that’s a college!). You can be an undergrad, a graduate student or anything in between.
  
• After you fan the ThinkTalk page (if you’re not already), decide what your dream internship would be and post it on the ThinkTalk wall. The short post should briefly include where your dream internship is and why. Once you tell us about your dream internship, you are entered into the contest. That’s it. It’s easy!
• To receive a bonus entry, tag 3 of your friends in your post on our wall using the following format:

  My dream internship would be ________ because _______. I think Jim (TAGGED), Bob (TAGGED) and Jane (TAGGED) should share their dream internship to win a Flip video camera, too.

• To tag a friend, type the "@" symbol in the Publisher text field (either to start the post or as a new word with a space before it) and the person’s name. If we see that you have tagged 3 of your friends in the internship post, we’ll give you a bonus entry.
• The winners will be drawn in a raffle, so take advantage of the bonus entry for a better chance to win. All posts must be made by 7 pm on Feb. 25 Eastern Standard Time. The winner of the ThinkTalk Dream Internship Contest will be announced on Friday, February 26 on our Facebook page and at the ThinkTalk blog. We will contact the winner by sending them a Facebook message.

Here's what a sample ThinkTalk Dream Internship post (with your friends tagged for a bonus entry) would look like on the ThinkTalk wall:

My dream internship would be at the New York Times, because I am studying to be a journalist. I think @Huckleberry Finn, @Holden Caulfield and @Lauren Conrad should share their dream internship to win a Flip video camera.

If you could have any internship you wanted, what would you do? Let us know! If you have any questions, please leave a comment down below or send us a message on Facebook.

Hey everyone! My name is Monica Karkhanis and I am currently a sophomore communication major with a focus in public relations at the University of Maryland, College Park. This is my first semester as an intern for Think Talk and I am really excited to blog about social media and how it can help your career. Find me on Twitter and be sure to continue following ThinkTalk!

In my last blog I talked about how establishing a strong online social network is important both for companies and for yourself. Having Facebook or Twitter not only keeps you in touch and up to date with your friends and family, it makes is possible for future employers to find out more about you as well. Whether or not you choose to use your social networking profiles for more than just, the obvious- social networking- potential employers can take advantage of Web sites we all know and use to find out lots of little details about you.

Employers can (and most will) Google you, Facebook you or find you on Twitter. Sounds scary, right? Fortunately (or unfortunately—depending on how you look at it as) you do not have to be a part of the CIA to find out everything you want to know about another individual. All you need is access to the Internet and you’re ready to stalk.

Last summer, Careerbuilder.com released the results from a survey of employers and how they use social media that should be enough to scare some sense into college students. According to the results, forty-five percent of employers use social networking sites to research job candidates:

Job seekers are cautioned to be mindful of the information they post online and how they communicate directly with employers. Thirty-five percent of employers reported they have found content on social networking sites that caused them not to hire the candidate. The top examples cited include:

• Candidate posted provocative or inappropriate photographs or information - 53 percent
• Candidate posted content about them drinking or using drugs - 44 percent
• Candidate bad-mouthed their previous employer, co-workers or clients - 35 percent
• Candidate showed poor communication skills - 29 percent
• Candidate made discriminatory comments - 26 percent

This presents a problem for many college students who are currently searching for a job or an internship while being careless with their profiles. Photos from the weekend and status updates that are being used to blow off steam can easily influence a potential employer’s view of you—before you even had a chance to be formally interviewed. This does not always seem fair, but the truth of the matter is, employers and hiring managers are going to be looking for an individual who appropriately represents their company or brand. What better way to do so than to see how you present your self through the World Wide Web?

You need to be aware of any and all content published to your pages—including photos, status updates, tweets, comments, groups you join and even pages you become a “fan of.” The second my mom friend requested me on Facebook was the second I realized I really needed to watch what goes up on my page. If you would not want your mother to see it, my opinion is to avoid publishing it to your website, because once you upload something it is online for more eyes to see than just those on your friend lists.

In an article about proper social networking etiquette in Forbes, Nancy Rothbard, a management professor at Wharton, emphasizes the damage you can do to your professional reputation by giving too much information away online:

Rothbard says that in face-to-face communications, people are much more careful about the volume and nature of the information they disclose. On the Internet, however, "there is a lot of lack of awareness--or obliviousness--about who is receiving this information." Someone using Twitter, for example, may think that only 20 people will read their message; meanwhile, millions of unknown people may stumble upon the information.

I know I’ve sometimes slipped up when I update my Facebook status, tweet my frustrations or forget to untag myself from unflattering photos that my college friends upload. We tend to forget that we are in a new hiring era now where our parents, professors and employers all use social networking as part of the hiring process.

You may be the most qualified for a position, with a laundry list of experience and well-deserved recommendations from college professors and former bosses, but if your Facebook page is stock full of provocative or questionable photos, you can be sure that your chances of landing that sweet internship or incredible job will be less than you would hope for.

On the plus side, because social media sites like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and others are becoming increasingly popular, using your networking sites in an appropriate and mindful way can help you land a job. This article from the HRGuru gives a run down on the top networking sites employers use to find good candidates for open positions.

So next time you see a fan page labeled “Wasted Wednesdays” or you are sent a group invite to join a funny but provocative club, I would think twice. Stay tuned to find what things job seekers should be doing to their profiles instead.

Hey everyone! My name is Monica Karkhanis and I am currently a sophomore communication major with a focus in public relations at the University of Maryland, College Park. This is my first semester as an intern for Think Talk and I am really excited to blog about social media and how it can help your career. Find me on Twitter and be sure to continue following ThinkTalk!

If you are anything like me, it is very likely that you are checking your Facebook more than a few times in a 30 minute span and your Twitter, Linked In and email accounts are all connected to your cell phone, which also has a direct link to your hip.

I'm a new intern here at Think Talk and for my first blog I figured I would write about my obsession with social media and how this obsession has become widely accepted and used by students, professors and career professionals alike. Okay, maybe I have been taking it a little too far ever since I downloaded the new Facebook app to my phone, but these days it has become nearly impossible for a company or business to survive without implementing and encouraging the use of social media. Before college, accessing Facebook during class was an absolute taboo. In fact, my high school in Maryland blocked all social networking sites from every campus computer. Today, however, many of my college classes at the University of Maryland actually praise and even require the use of social media and networking sites.

I believe adding social networking know-how and tech-savvy skills to my resume keeps me ahead of the game. Several of my college professors in the communication and public relations field hold a series of lectures based solely on social media. My professors encourage learning about different methods and platforms of communication to effectively send a message across while still being able to keep up with today's fast-paced and growing world.

In an article I just read from the University of New Hampshire (ThinkTalk school!), a student writer interviewed a professor teaching a new course covering all aspects of social media. Professor Chuck Martin of UNH is not only an accomplished author of eight different business books, but he is also the third most followed marketing professor on all of Twitter. In my eyes, that means he has made it big and he probably has a few words of wisdom to give to students in the field of marketing and communication.

“Social media is really, really big in business right now,” said Martin. “Even if the business doesn’t want to do anything in social media they have to because their clients and customers are connecting in these ways.”

Because social media is impacting all aspects of business and all kinds of business, said Martin, anybody in marketing needs to understand social media.

They don’t need to like it, but understand it,” said Martin.

So businesses have no choice but to keep up with social media to connect with clients, even if they cringe at the thought of managing a profile or Twitter account to tweet their daily activities. While it sounds silly, I agree with Martin in that using social media to promote and establish a brand for yourself or your business can go a long way. Take Google, for example; even though they are one of the largest companies right now in the world of business and do not need much more promotion, they know all too well not to neglect the importance of social media. With over thirty separate Twitter accounts based on region, cultures, types of technology and other areas, Google manages to continue to stay on top -- connecting the company to the world and beyond.

If even Google has to do it, then I figure I should, too. Stay tuned for my next post as I start exploring how social media can help me (and you) find a job.

Are you tired of parents and professors telling you that all that time you spend on Facebook and YouTube could be affecting your grades? Well, now you have some data to throw back at them. The Whitmore School of Business at the University of New Hampshire has released a new study on the correlation between social network usage and grades, and found that there isn't much of one (via Inside Higher Ed's Quick Takes).

Grades followed similar distributions for all colleges, with the majority of students earning A's and B's. The study showed that more students use Facebook and YouTube than any other social media platform. Blogs, Twitter, MySpace, and LinkedIn had significantly lower amounts of student users. Students from the business school had the highest percentage of users of blogs, Twitter, and LinkedIn while liberal arts students were the highest percentage of MySpace users.

The researchers studied 1,100 students across a variety of disciplines at UNH and found some other useful findings. Facebook is the most popular social networking site (duh!) with 96% of students surveyed using the site. What's surprising, however, is that only 10% of the students used LinkedIn. Personally, this is a bit disappointing. LinkedIn can be a powerful networking tool for your career, and should be fired up around the time of your first internship as a way to connect with colleagues, and form an evolving record of your employment.

For all of the data, download a summary of the findings here.

If you are a college student or a recent grad, you almost certainly spend much of time on the internet - and a significant portion of that on social networking sites like Facebook (definitely), YouTube (You bet), Twitter (not too much) or MySpace (Whose space?). But, how do you spend your time on these popular sites?

Well, if - like most people - you use them to gossip, watch stupid videos or post inappropriate pics, you are wasting your time. The Chronicle of Higher Education reports that finally business are getting smart about Social Networks ... IBM has announced a Facebook Application to find mentors for students.

Through a Facebook application, which IBM plans to offer in a pilot program in the United States this fall, students like Mr. Vogt, a sophomore at Pace University, can find mentors to give them practical or career advice, or oversee student projects, said Tim Willeford, a spokesman for IBM.

“We have existing mentorship programs within IBM, so it’s a natural extension that we’re trying to connect experts of multiple disciplines to university students,” Mr. Willeford said. “It’s one of the next steps in education.” ...

“Facebook and MySpace are great places for social networking, but they don’t really have a goal. They don’t make the kind of connections you need to move forward,” Mr. Vogt said. “This platform is helping students say, Here are my ideas, and IBM is saying, Come work with us and we’ll help you.”

It's good to see companies getting smart about using the sites to reach out to students where they are comfortable. These sites have a lot of potential, and in a career-related function can be useful to extend and capitalize on your network to land a job. I hope to see more companies reaching out across multiple platforms to provide opportunities like this for students.

On to The Links ...

GradSpot Suggests Careers For Night Owls: Aside from the obvious jobs of Bartending, club promoting and hospitality (hotels/casinos) GS adds "many companies (at least the ones that don't outsource to India!) need people to handle administrative tasks before the daytime workers get to the office in the morning—look out for data entry positions at financial services institutions or copy editing gigs at daily newspapers, for example." I would include financial services that deal with Europe/Asia as well.

Your HR Shares How His Blog Landed Him a Job: He found a niche community, contributed to it and networked out a gig. Advice for you: "If you think of blogging like you do networking, you need to start a blog, contribute and become a part of the community before you can leverage it to help you find a great job (either by your choice or the company’s)."

The Washington Post Advises on Email Etiquette: Specifically, the all-important sign off. "Will Schwalbe, co-author with David Shipley of 'Send: Why People Email So Badly and How to Do It Better,' warns, 'You can really do a lot of damage, even with a careless closing. And one of the terrifying things about e-mail is: You may never know.'" This is why I end all my emails with "Get Bent" ... no confusion on that one.

Keppie Careers Discusses Online Transparency: And it's an important and relevant discussion; how much info to share. Share to little and you damage the benefits of Online Branding. Share too much, and you risk crossing a line that an employer might not appreciate. I think the best advice is to carefully consider each piece of information you put on the web, before you put it out there.

Jibber Jobber Laughs at the College Grad Suing Her College for Her Inability to Get a Job: "In summary, this person went to school, apparently got a BA degree in something to do with 'information technology,' and I guess couldn’t land a job. So she is suing saying her career services office 'didn’t [live] up to its end of the deal [by] offering her the leads and employment advice it promised.' This recent grad has lived at home with her mom, who is a substitute teacher and is 'the only one of the two who makes any money.'"

Jibber Jobber Explains How NOT To Spend Your Time When Unemployed: "What's scary, at least to me, is that on any given day only 20% are spending time job searching, mostly in the morning and early afternoon. I know job searching is hard work, and it can be easier to try and avoid it. However, you're not going to find a job if you don't work at it. It's that simple."

Welcome to the Daily Roundup. Each day at the ThinkTalk Blog we will post some links that we find informative, interesting, or just plain funny. The goal is to let you know what else is going on out there, and ultimately help you with the development of your career.