This post was originally published on Higher Ed Live. Find out more about roommate matching software.

TJ Logan, University of Florida Associate Director of Housing for Administrative Services, and Robert Castellucci, President & CEO of RoomSync, join the show to discuss how University of Florida has used a Facebook-based roommate matching tool to reduce conflict and increase student satisfaction and success.

In an industry often obsessed with Likes and Retweets, Facebook-based roommate matching is shaping up to be one of the single strongest example of social media ROI in higher ed.

I sat in on an excellent session this week at #NASPAtech put on by Ed Cabellon of Bridgewater State University entitled "social media strategy and planning". The focus of the session was obvious from the title, but what was not obvious is how Ed would teach the session.  

Rather than doing the normal slides highlighting keys to social media strategizing, he took a collaborative approach. Ed engaged audience members by enlisting all of us to build a social media strategy for our joint institution. On every slide, he led a guided discussion where we had to think critically about the key components of our strategy. What were our goals? What should our social media voice be? Should we use ;) or just stick with basic smiley faces? All this discussion made for a more engaged audience and, ultimately, more learning by the attendees, including myself.

Another example of this approach to education is at the University of Florida, where I graduated with my Masters in Entrepreneurship. I had been circling around the idea of roommate matching software powered by Facebook for the past year and finally decided to start the business during the first semester of the MSE program. By having a company of my own, all of the classes made more sense and became infinitely more useful. I could template all of the entrepreneurial classes over how they could benefit RoomSync.  

The other thing that Ed's presentation made me think of was a website I found last night called codecademy which teaches people how to program. Why did I think of this? Try signing up for the site and you'll know. They make you code in order to register for an account! Genius.  

Too much of the education that I witness in K-12 and higher education is not taught like this. Instead, professors are asking students to regurgitate dates and equations. I hope to see a growing number of approaches to education like the ones above.