Announcing STEAM Factory on Slack! FAQ and How to Join!
We are happy to announce a new way to engage with STEAM and the STEAM community! Introducing STEAM on Slack, a digital messaging platform where you can chat with other STEAM members! This can be a great way for you to further collaborate and connect with other STEAM members outside of STEAM events or listservs or, in general, outside of STEAM's walls.
In this article, I will try to answer the common questions surrounding Slack, and why you should join. We're very excited to see where this Slack community goes and how our members engage with it!
Join the STEAM Factory Slack Community
What is Slack?
Slack is a digital messaging board application that is completely free to use. You can download it on both your phone and computer and is also available for both Windows and Apple operating systems.
On Slack, you can either message others through a public-facing messaging board, called a channel, or through direct private messages that only the chosen recipient can see. Channels are organized around specific topics, such as the social channel, where members can have casual conversations. When you send a message in a specific channel, only others who have joined that channel can see the message, meaning that conversations in a channel will remain organized around the specific topic of the channel.
When you join a Slack community, you can select which specific channels you are interested in joining. You can tailor the experience that you get on Slack around your specific needs and wants. This is a great extension of STEAM's "Choose Your Own Adventure" membership model, where we encourage members to engage with STEAM how they want to.
Why is STEAM Factory on Slack?
We want to provide our members with more ways to interact with, connect with, and collaborate with each other when they aren't at STEAM in-person. We believe that by giving you all more ways to connect with each other, that can lead to more opportunities for collaborations, initiatives, projects and research. Or, even outside of that, this can lead to more networking and friend-making! Our Slack community will be very member-driven and we're excited to see what it can turn in to!
Why should I join STEAM's Slack community?
As hinted at above, we believe that this community can turn into a STEAM community outside of STEAM's walls, meaning more opportunities to engage with other STEAM members and form new connections. If you're not interested in that, joining this Slack will be a great way to keep up-to-date with everything going on with STEAM outside of your email inbox.
How do I join STEAM's Slack community?
You can join our Slack community by clicking the button below. Then, you'll be able to choose which specific channels you would like to join.
