NOTE: The loop was discontinued around 2018. However it was a great project and wanted to provided an overview of this project below!
1. What is the Loop?
The Loop is a private authenticated social network tailored for stimulating conversation among prospective students who have applied for admission. It also is built to encourage informative discussions between prospective students, RIT students and RIT faculty. The main goal is to introduce, inform and engage prospective students who are considering RIT as their college of choice.
Figure a – View of the homepage navigation and status posting area.
a. Popular Uses
- Finding a roommate
- Meeting new people (the matchmaking component)
- Finding people with common interests (ex: golf, computer gaming, etc.)
- Asking questions to a specific cohort.
- Cohort Examples: Alumni, Current Students (Ambassadors), Faculty
b. Why not Facebook?
The Loop is not meant to compete with Facebook; in fact, we still maintain an Accepted Student Facebook Group for each fall accepted class. There are several differentiators that have justified the need for such a network. Many of these features will be broken down further in the documentation.
- Scope of audience – all applicants versus just accepts in the Facebook group
- Matchmaking component
- Authenticated access – more private
- Ability to deliver customized RIT content, news, YouTube: social channels
- Sub-Groups (not currently possible in Facebook)
- A place for non-Facebook users
Facebook by nature will likely always be easier for certain communications given its cross platform availability and fact that many students are already on it. However, its inability to offer some of the functions described help justify the need for The Loop.
However, none of this can be achieved without the participation and support from the RIT community. As we add new members, we believe these advantages will become more apparent and applicants will gradually find it easier to connect with others and get individualized resources from their respective college and peers.
