Friends are one of the most important things that we need in our lives. They give us a chance to offer much needed companionship whether that be advice, support, or as simple as just talking. However, we all have our own goals and future career paths when it comes to selecting a college. Most of the time we don’t go to the same college as all of our friends and we may be lucky to have two or three. BUT this offers us an opportunity to meet new people and make many different connections at a new place. 

One of the key things that every rising freshman should do when going into college is making connections with other students. Finding other students with similar interests, like sports or majors, can help with homesickness and ease your way into college. A discourse community that helps introduce students to others is an Instagram class page account. 

The people in this discourse community are incoming college freshmen with the account being run by multiple upperclassmen at the school. The account works by direct messaging the account owner your name, major, picture of yourself, and a paragraph that introduces yourself to anyone who follows the page. Once this is completed, the account owner will then post the picture of you along with your name, major, and paragraph. 

I was involved in a Instagram class page as a way of introducing myself to other students. The goal of this Instagram class page is to help students make new connections with others and help with the feeling of being homesick. It was very helpful for me and other students because it allowed me to hit the ground running after I had moved into my dorm. Was able to immediately go out with new friends and check out the UC Davis campus and Downtown Davis. Some of the most important core values that this D.C. values is community and friendship. It values community because it brings together the rising class and allows them to work together. It also values friendship because through this Instagram page, everyone can interact with each other by commenting on the post or direct messaging a certain person that may have similar interests as you. As far as conflicts goes, I hadn’t really seen any conflicts/problems when I had followed my class page. However, I have heard of people making rude and obscene comments on other peoples posts. A way that this is prevented is either the owner deleting the comment or others reporting the comment as bullying or harassment. 

Some of the limitations that I may encounter on this D.C. may be finding sources. The instagram page is a great source to use in this paper but I wonder if there are any scholarly sources that talk about social media pages and how it helps with making connections. I understand that this is a more significant issue than other but with enough research I believe that I can find reliable sources that can help with my thesis and argument.