Students Prefer IM to Email

Via eSchool News:

For students, eMail already is outdated
Students prefer instant messaging as a communication tool, new survey suggests

A growing number of teachers--more than a third of those polled--now use eMail to communicate with their students, according to the results of a new national survey released May 3.

Problem is, most students now think eMail is outdated as a communication tool.

According to NetDay's third annual "Speak Up" survey, sponsored by Dell Inc. and the BellSouth Foundation, 97 percent of teachers now say they use eMail on a weekly basis to communicate with colleagues, administrators, and the parents of their students--and 35 percent say they use eMail to reach students themselves.

But at the same time teachers are becoming more comfortable with using eMail, students have largely moved on to another, more sophisticated form of communication, the survey suggests: instant messaging (IM).

About 65 percent of students in grades 6-12 taking the survey said they use eMail or IM every day. But a closer look at the survey results reveals that students are much more likely to use IM to communicate with each other than eMail.

"Students have told us that eMail is still valuable--mainly for storing and transmitting documents and for communication with adults," said Julie Evans, chief executive officer of the nonprofit group NetDay. "IM is more valuable to them because it is instant, and they can speak with multiple people at the same time. I believe that this highlights a greater sophistication in student tech use--and a trend for us to watch."

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