Over the roar of the 27,000 cheering fans, while his fingers tap out official, real-time tweets, Shane Evans ’08 will tell you that going to Cabrini College has really paid off.
As digital media manager for one of Major League Soccer’s most successful organizations, the Seattle Sounders FC, Shane uses the web and social media to energize the club’s fan-base and help sustain the Sounders’ league-leading attendance.
Shane wanted to go into communications since starting high school and he chose Cabrini because the College offered the real-world experiences that employers demand.
“The really great thing about my journalism class was that the whole class was dedicated to preparing me to be a journalist in the field,” Shane says.
Even as a Cabrini student, he was able to build-up his resume as web editor for Cabrini’s student newspaper, The Loquitur, and by interning as a website journalist for the Philadelphia Eagles.
“Talking to a six-foot-five, 300-pound lineman after a loss can be daunting,” said Shane. “At first it’s hard, but they’re so professional about it.”
In Seattle during a Sounders FC game, Shane keeps busy with those real-time tweets for the team’s official Twitter account.
“I bring some personality and fun to it, going beyond who scored at what minute,” Shane says.
One result of his efforts is that the club boasts a strong following abroad, from the UK to South Africa—fans who could never connect with the Sounders in the same way without the geography-collapsing link of the web.