Summary
“Analyzing Online Student Communities Using Text mining” is a proposed digital humanities project that examines what students talk about in public online spaces. The project collects text from platforms such as Reddit, Instagram comments, public Discord channels, and local anonymous posts to identify major themes in student life. Using text-mining tools, the project analyzes patterns related to stress, academics, mental health, housing, campus resources, and social life. The goal is to understand student experiences through their digital conversations and present the findings through visualizations, word clouds, and topic summaries.
Project Details
Who:
- Proposed and designed by Alex for DHM280 Project 3
- Uses publicly available student-generated content
- Intended for WCU students, faculty, advisors, and student support services
Where:
Data comes from public online platforms:
- Public Discord channels
- Instagram comments on WCU-related posts
- Local anonymous posts
When:
- Project proposed in Spring 2026
- Data reflects current student conversation
- Could be updated each semester as student concerns change
What:
A digital humanities project using text mining to analyze online student discourse:
- Word clouds
- Frequency charts
- Topic Clusters
- Sentiment patterns
- Summaries of recurring themes
Focuses on understanding student’s experiences through digital communication
Audience
- WCU students
- Faculty and academic advisors
- Student support offices
- Administrators interested in student well-being
- Researchers studying digital culture or student discourse