Duke TikTok Class

Submission 789

Part of a series on TikTok. [View Related Entries]

About

Duke TikTok Class refers to the class "Building Global Audiences" at Duke University in Durham, North Carolina, which is often referred to as "TikTok class" or "influencer class" online and by students. The class "teaches future entrepreneurs how to harness the power of social media to promote a brand or cause," also teaching about "ethical posting." It was launched in 2022 and has since become the subject of discussion online, including videos and memes on TikTok. In March 2024, TikToker @stylebyreagan went viral by filming a video in which she asked students in TikTok Class whether or not they think the basketball players will attend class after winning a game, which some implied might be racist due to her use of the term "basketball kids."

Origin

Duke University began offering the class "Building Global Audiences" in 2022. The class is often referred to as "TikTok class" and "influencer class" as a nickname. Duke University's^[1] page for the class describes it:

Marketing and publicity are so important to audience building that, 20 years ago, expanding beyond local audiences usually couldn't be accomplished without huge advertising budgets. However, thanks to the Internet, you can build a global audience from your dorm room. This class explores how. Learn about social media, search engine optimization, virality, content marketing, growth hacking, and other digital audience building strategies. They're difficult to learn and time consuming to execute, so expect to struggle. We'll learn as much from our failures as we will from our successes as we discover what it takes to cultivate global awareness for an idea without ever leaving Durham.

On February 21st, 2022, the Duke Innovation and Entrepreneurship YouTube^[2] channel posted a video featuring testimonials on the class (shown below). The class first became the subject of discussions and media attention online in May 2022. For example, on May 6th, 2022, Bloomberg^[3] published an article about it, followed by News 18^[4] on May 15th.

Spread

TikTok class became an increasing subject of discussion throughout the 2020s, with videos of the class also being uploaded to TikTok. On May 17th, 2023, Cosmopolitan^[5] published an article about the class.

On November 29th, TikToker^[6] @lilly.eva posted a video from TikTok class, garnering around 15,000 views in four months (shown below, left). On March 6th, 2024, TikToker^[7] @natisstyle posted a video of TikTok class that gained over 32,000 views in three weeks (shown below, right).

StyleByReagan's "Basketball Kids" Video

On March 26th, 2024, TikToker^[8] @stylebyreagan posted a video in which she attends TikTok class following a big win for the Duke University basketball team. In the video, she goes around the class and asks the teacher and students if they think the "basketball kids" will attend class. At the end of the video, she reveals that two of the basketball players showed up to class (shown below). The video gained over 1.1 million views in a day.

Also on March 26th, Ball Durham^[9] reported on the video in an article titled, "Duke basketball players attend class following 38-point victory against James Madison."

Later that same day, TikToker^[10] @callmetibss posted a video claiming that Black Twitter was canceling Reagan for the video, with many in the comments assuming it was over her use of the term "basketball kids," although many also argued that the term is not racist. The TikToker does not elaborate on the purported cancelation or offer a link to the purported post criticizing her. The video gained over 2 million views in under 24 hours (shown below).