SU students build niche communities through Instagram

Instagram has become a part of the glue that holds Syracuse University students together. Some just take pictures to share with friends. But some students, such as Eric King and Olivia Feng, use Instagram to connect the SU community.

@DogsofNewhouse on Instagram is run by King, a junior magazine journalism major. While sitting in a booth in food.com, King noticed the increasing amount of dogs that pass through Newhouse and wanted to document them for other students to see. He said he felt as though this was a quirky thing that made Newhouse special.

This account offers the dog coverage that Newhouse students, faculty and staff crave, King said.

Although the @DogsofNewhouse account only has a few photos posted, the feedback he has received has been positive.

King turned to Instagram as his social media platform of choice and after just a couple of weeks, the account has gained 138 followers as of 8:30 p.m. Tuesday night. What started out as a hobby, grew into something popular among Newhouse students.

“Twitter is dead and Facebook is more personal,” King explained. He chose Instagram because he thought it was a great place to start a community.

King has even opened up his account to all SU students, allowing for them to submit their own photos for his followers to see.

Another SU student, Feng, has created her own original brand through her Instagram. The sophomore finance and accounting major in the Martin J. Whitman School of Management founded @SUGlance on campus to record the style trends of a variety of students.

Courtesy of Eric King

After coming to Syracuse from Beijing, Feng wanted to get involved in an extracurricular she was truly interested in. But she was looking for something different from the clubs on campus.

Her goal was to take the “street snaps” idea of taking pictures of stylish people on the streets that is popular in China and Japan, and make it more personable to students. So she formed her own club, collaborating with friends and classmates to photograph and find college fashionistas on the SU campus. With a team of 20 students, SUGlance has been at work for a little bit over a year.

Nubia Dandridge, a sophomore television, radio and film and philosophy major, created a documentary with her classmates about SUGlance. The short video follows Feng and the SUGlance crew as they take photos of students passing by.

“Olivia is passionate about what she loves and works very hard,” Dandridge said.

SUGlance is where Feng can release all of her energy and share what she finds interesting to the Syracuse community.

Through Instagram, Facebook and Tumblr, SUGlance shares photographs of people wearing different styles around Syracuse. Of all the platforms, Feng prefers Instagram.

“Everyone has one and it’s so in trend now,” Feng said. “Our photos are touched up and made to look more professional, and Instagram is the perfect place for them to be displayed.”

SUGlance has collaborated with other student organizations, such as Chinese Platform, which is a blog made for the Chinese community of students at SU. The SUGlance team often writes articles about styles on campus for this blog.

Courtesy of Olivia Feng

In the past, SUGlance has photographed sorority bid day shirts, in order to promote the Panhellenic community. Feng believes that reaching out to different groups of people allows for them express their own identity, and she wants to share that with the SU community and the world.

“What we want to do next is continue doing this street photography and collaborate with different organizations more often,” Feng said.

Feng expressed her interest in turning SUGlance into Glance, a college brand that will be available at other schools across the United States. While reaching out to friends at other universities in order to continue sharing the styles of college fashionistas, the SUGlance club will cover Mayfest, Block Party and the Senior Fashion Show.

These Instagram accounts are vastly different, but have a common goal. Both @DogsofNewhouse and @SUGlance share more than just photos with SU students — they aim to create a community through their followers.