Swift Kick Central

2008 Swift Kick Program Calendar

As we close the door on 2008, here's a look back at who we worked with:

01/02/08 APCA Advisors Institute
01/03/08 APCA Advisors Institute
01/04/08 APCA Advisors Institute
01/04/08 Shepherd U
01/19/08 Potsdam U
01/30/08 Emporia State
02/01/08 U. Of Alaska
02/08/08 Western State College
02/10/08 Wesley College
02/12/08 Boise State
02/15/08 27th Annual FYE Conference
02/16/08 27th Annual FYE Conference
02/17/08 27th Annual FYE Conference
02/18/08 27th Annual FYE Conference
02/19/08 27th Annual FYE Conference
02/23/08 SUNY Cobleskill
02/26/08 U. of Missouri
02/26/08 Lake Forest College
02/27/08 Darton College
02/28/08 Bossier Parish
02/29/08 Baker U.
03/11/08 SUNY Rockland
03/12/08 Hudson Valley CC
03/12/08 APCA Nationals
03/13/08 APCA Nationals
03/14/08 APCA Nationals
03/15/08 APCA Nationals
03/26/08 U of San Diego
03/28/08 APCA Northeast
03/29/08 APCA Northeast
03/30/08 APCA Northeast
04/05/08 SUNY Cobleskill
04/15/08 Everett CC
04/16/08 East Carolina U
04/17/08 U of Washington Tacoma
04/18/08 Big Bend CC
05/02/08 San Antonio College
05/06/08 Snow College
05/07/08 Snow College
05/08/08 Snow College
05/12/08 Texas State San Marcos
05/13/08 Texas State San Marcos
05/14/08 Texas State San Marcos
05/15/08 Texas A&M International
06/03/08 ICCSAA Conference
06/04/08 Dakota Association For College Admissions Conference
06/06/08 Norfolk Navy Base
08/08/08 Army Boss Conference
08/12/08 Xavier University
08/13/08 Weber State University
08/18/08 UW Madison
08/19/08 University of Akron Ohio
08/20/08 San Antonio College
08/21/08 Penn State Lehigh
08/22/08 Utah Valley State
08/23/08 Penn State Erie
08/24/08 Schreiner University
08/28/08 University of Mary
08/30/08 Bridgewater
08/31/08 Graceland University
08/31/08 Rivier College
09/06/08 Shepherd College
09/08/08 Johnson and Wales - Denver
09/10/08 US Navy Norfolk
09/11/08 US Navy Norfolk
09/12/08 Winthrop University
09/13/08 Winthrop University
09/14/08 Winthrop University
09/16/08 Southeastern Louisiana
09/17/08 Georgia Southwestern State
09/19/08 Weber State University
09/20/08 Darton College
09/24/08 Clarkson College
09/25/08 ASGA National Conference
09/26/08 Howard Community College
09/26/08 Fulton-Montgomery
10/02/08 Parkland College
10/03/08 Rock Valley College
10/04/08 Coastal Georgia College
10/07/08 Palm Beach Community College
10/07/08 Reading Area
10/08/08 Lynn University
10/10/08 San Antonio College
10/15/08 Mohawk Valley
10/21/08 Pasco-Hernando Community College
10/25/08 ASGA Chicago Conference
11/08/08 Houston Community College
11/10/08 APCA Iowa Conference
11/11/08 APCA Iowa Conference
11/12/08 APCA Iowa Conference
11/14/08 Lord Fairfax Community College
11/15/08 Lord Fairfax Community College
11/17/08 APCA Verona Conference
11/18/08 APCA Verona Conference
11/19/08 APCA Verona Conference
12/04/08 Baton Rouge Community College


Check out our 2007 Program Calendar
Check out our 2006 Program Calendar

Swift Kick Helps "Meh" Become an Official Word

Well ok we weren't the main driving force, but for the past 5 years the term "meh" has been a cornerstone of our Dance Floor Theory Leadership Training and with 200+ college trainings under our belt I feel like we've done our part to help push the "meh" agenda.

In DFT we show student leaders how to segment their student population to allow for better target marketing of events. Our segmentation is based on Joseph Campbell's "Hero's Journey" and Maslov's Hierarchy of Needs.


The majority of students hang out near the bottom of the pyramid in the Neutral Zone. These are the students who will never show up to any college sponsored activity. According to the 2005 National Survey on Student Engagement, the Neutral Zone makes up 60%-84% of the total student body (60% for four-year colleges and 84% for two-year colleges).

To better help understand each stage, we attached humanizing characteristics. For example, the 3s, 4s, and 5s are your student leaders. They are the ones who are throwing the party instead of going to the party. The 2s are what we call your "Free Pizza People." They will attend any event as long as there is something in it for them. The 1s go "hmm" because for the first time they are curious enough about something on campus to make them stop and think.


Then there are the Neutrals, which is just a nice way of saying zero. The Neutrals make up the biggest part of most campuses, but yet are the least marketed to. You can tell Neutrals from the rest because yesterday looks like today and it will look just like tomorrow. Out of all the words we tested to best describe this group, "Meh" stuck the best. Neutrals wake up in the morning and go "Meh," they look in the mirror and go "Meh," they head to class and go "Meh," they sit in class and go "Meh," and so on for the rest of the day. These are your apathetic students and our unofficial rally cry "Meh," is now officially part of the Collins English Dictionary. Stay tuned for the "Meh" induction party... I just hope people show up.

Podcast on Technology and the Future of Higher Education

In a podcast with Paul Miller of Project Xiphos, Kevin talked about technology and the future of higher education. The podcast runs 38 minutes, but if your time is short, here are some key quotes from Kevin I pulled while listening.

- Education needs technology to stay relevant

- Apathy is oil in the ground waiting to be tapped

- We are giving up control to participate

- If we don't give up control we loose the communication channel.

- Sequestering students in our private walled garden that we paid a lot of money for is really doing them a disservice.

- The role of the institution is....teaching students how to be public.

- Established big players don't typically make the jump to the next shift. They don't participate in the disruption of their own business model.

- One of the primary things Blackboard sells is privacy and security.

- The Ebay peer-to-peer assessment model is far more exciting than the professorial model.

- We can care about [the students] more than the lawyers who care about duty of care.

What A Lovely Walled Garden It Is

To write this post, I'm currently "hacked" into the wifi system of a small community college on the east coast. For fear of my safety and those involved, I've hidden the identity of individuals in the story below.

My mission started out simple enough; spend 1 hour online to check my email and catch up on the latest from icanhascheezburger.com.

I asked a student walking around if they had wifi on campus. "You mean wireless internet?" "Yes." She pointed me towards the library.

In the library I opened my laptop and was confronted with a password to access the wifi. Fair enough, IT wants to protect the other 1000 people from the community from plugging in and stealing their goodies.

I asked the librarian what the password was. She said to get a password I had to talk to IT which is located in the Arts Building. "Really?" "Yes." "Where's the Art's building?" "Across campus, about a 10 minute walk." "Really?" "Yes."

After two wrong turns and 20 minutes later I found the IT room tucked away with a closed door. I opened the door to two older folks staring at me like I might steal some blue network cords.

On the front desk was a note stating to get a password for wifi I needed a student ID and a valid government ID. Hmmmm, maybe they'll let me substitute my Starbucks Gift Card for a student ID?

"I'm a guest on campus for the day, so how can I access the wifi?" "You mean wireless internet?" "Yes." "Oh, hmmmm, well, hmmmm, right. Let me check."

She called her boss who was not in his office. "Sorry I need his permission to let you access the wifi. There's nothing I can do." "Really?" "Yes." "Wow."

So here I am "hacked" into the wifi system of a small community college on the east coast and what a lovely walled garden it is.

Funny Google Searches for Swift Kick

As a child my parents nicknamed me The Count because I used to count the number of pennies in our HUGE family coin jar. Though I no longer count the number of pennies laying around, I do admittedly have an obsession with watching our blog numbers and calculating it's monthly growth. Call me a geek, it's ok I accept it.

The two major places where we receive our blog traffic information is from our Typepad dashboard and from Google Analytics:

One chart shows us all the keywords people type into Google to find our blog. Most of the keywords are normal words like Swift Kick, College Lecture, Myspace Lecture, Dance Floor Theory Leadership Training, Tom Krieglstein, Kevin Prentiss etc. Every so often there's a search that is too enjoyable to let go by:

I assume they were searching for our leadership training program, Dance Floor Theory and pieced together the best set of words they knew to describe it. It worked! Thanks to the person who did this search, it put a smile on our faces :)

The Video of the interview about Red Rover with Peter Barnes of Fox Business TV

Interview about Red Rover with Peter Barnes of Fox Business TV

In case you happen to be up and about at 6:45am tomorrow (Jan 23rd) tune into the morning edition of Fox Business TV with Peter Barnes. He is interviewing me about Red Rover, Swift Kick, Ideablob and why I like peanut butter so much.

Yes I did say 6:45am :)

We should have a copy of the interview posted here tomorrow in case you need the extra sleep.

Key Step for Setting Up Mozes

Julie of Navy MWR fame is playing around with Mozes and had a set up question. As I usually mention when talking about Mozes.com, I love the service, but the actual website is pretty confusing.

In the hopes of answering Julie's question, I made a quick screencast showing the important initial set up, and I'm putting it up here for others who (will) have the same question.

Click on the image below to open up the screen cast:

Let me know how it works!

2007 Swift Kick Program Calendar

As we close the door on 2007, here's a look back at who we worked with.

01/02/07 APCA Las Vegas Advisors Summit
01/03/07 APCA Las Vegas Advisors Summit
01/04/07 APCA Las Vegas Advisors Summit
01/23/07 Valencia CC
01/27/07 University of Alabama - Birmingham
01/27/07 Nazareth College
02/11/07 Lees-McRae College
02/17/07 NACA Nationals
02/18/07 NACA Nationals
02/19/07 NACA Nationals
02/20/07 NACA Nationals
02/21/07 NACA Nationals
02/27/07 US Army International Conference
03/01/07 APCA Nationals
03/02/07 APCA Nationals
03/03/07 APCA Nationals
03/04/07 APCA Nationals
03/07/07 John Hopkins University
03/20/07 Wesley College
03/23/07 APCA Northeast
03/24/07 APCA Northeast
03/25/07 APCA Northeast
03/24/07 Southeastern Louisiana University
04/09/07 Columbia Basin College
04/12-15/07 NACA Northern Plains
04/25/07 Fordham University - Rose Hill
05/01/07 US Army Boss Program
05/16/07 Texas State Univeristy
06/02/07 Miami Dade College
06/23/07 Valencia Community College
07/08/07 APCA FL Advisor Institute
07/09/07 APCA FL Advisor Institute
07/10/07 APCA FL Advisor Institute
07/27/07 APCA Chicago Leadership Conference
07/28/07 APCA Chicago Leadership Conference
07/29/07 APCA Chicago Leadership Conference
08/05/07 APCA NY Leadership Conference
08/06/07 APCA NY Leadership Conference
08/07/07 APCA NY Leadership Conference
08/19/07 Schreiner College
08/20/07 De Sales University
08/20/07 College of Dupage
08/21/07 University of Akron Ohio
08/21/07 Sam Houston State University
08/22/07 Texas A & M International
08/23/07 Penn State - Shenango
08/23/07 Penn State - Lehigh Valley
08/24/07 Queens College
08/24/07 Saint Mary’s University
08/25/07 Penn State - Erie
08/26/07 Kutztown
09/07/07 Howard Comm College
09/12/07 University of Wisconsin - Milwaukee
09/13/07 Greensboro College
09/15/07 Winthrop University
09/17/07 Morningside College
09/18/07 Coe College
09/19/07 Drake Unviersity
09/20/07 Iowa Wesleyan
09/21/07 APCA Midwest
09/22/07 APCA Midwest
09/23/07 APCA Midwest
09/21/07 Berry College
09/24/07 LACUSPA
09/25/07 Society of Success
09/26/07 Chippewa Valley Tech
09/26/07 St. Paul College
09/27/07 WITC
09/29/07 University of Wisconsin - Green Bay
10/05/07 Lord Fairfax CC
10/06/07 Lord Fairfax CC
10/05/07 Coastal Georgia CC
10/06/07 Hunter College
10/09/07 College of Dupage
10/09/07 Augustana College
10/10/07 U. of Minnesota Crookston
10/11/07 North Dakota State U.
10/12/07 APCA Verona
10/13/07 APCA Verona
10/14/07 APCA Verona
10/14/07 Manhattenville College
10/19/07 ACUI Regional Conference
10/20/07 ACUI Regional Conference
10/20/07 ASGA Mid America
10/21/07 ASGA Mid America
10/24/07 Hunter College
10/27/07 Kean College
10/30/07 Valencia CC
10/31/07 Valencia CC
11/02/07 APCA South Central
11/03/07 APCA South Central
11/04/07 APCA South Central
11/05/07 APCA South Central
11/08/07 NACA West
11/09/07 NACA West
11/10/07 NACA West
11/11/07 NACA West
11/09/07 Bridgewater College
11/10/07 Wesley College
11/13/07 U. of WI - Milwaukee
11/13/07 Fordham University
11/15/07 Mott CC


Check out our 2006 Program Calendar

Judging Student Literacy

It's blog entries like Noichole Pinkard's that keep my excitement flowing about the potential future of education. Here's my favorite line:

I conjecture that by 2018, a student will routinely be judged not only by her ability to write a 5-paragraph essay but her ability to represent her ideas via a 5 minute podcast, 2 minute movie, and level in an educational [video] game.