By Ava Geaniotis

This Adelphi professor may not have a master’s degree in education, but with over 6 years of real-world experience in her discipline, she’s a master in what she teaches: Content Creation & Social Media Influencing.

Malika Burieva is an Adelphi alumna and now an adjunct professor in Adelphi’s Communications Department teaching a course on a topic she’s been passionate about and living in for years.

Burieva is 24 years old now, but her passion for content creation has forever been a central aspect of her life. When she was a child, she first began making videos on YouTube. She said, “I’ve always been into editing, I’ve always loved these nitty-gritty things – tech, production.”

She began to take content creation more seriously in 2020 during the COVID-19 pandemic. During lockdown, she started posting on Instagram and TikTok. After trial-and-error with creating different content, she posted a video following a “What Asian are you?” trend. She shared that she was Central Asian – particularly, Uzbek – and comments were overwhelmingly positive and expressed that her video made Central Asian viewers feel recognized for their culture, too.

From this experience, she found her niche in making content about her culture. Since then, Burieva has earned over 100,000 followers collectively between TikTok and Instagram. 

During her time at Adelphi, Burieva was in Levermore Global Scholars, a member of the Asian Students Intercultural Alliance Club and was the social media editor and production designer for The Delphian. After receiving her Communications degree in 2023, Burieva said that she never expected to return to Adelphi so soon – this time, as a teacher.

During the course’s first semester, in order to get to campus for class, Burieva had to make the same commute from Brooklyn to Adelphi as she did when she was a student. Even with early mornings waking up at 5 a.m. and her long commute, Burieva said, “It’s worth it.”

She added, “I get to have amazing students and just really amazing people that grow with me, and I can grow with them, too.”

Her new course, Content Creation & Social Media Influencing (COM-369-003), finished its first semester in Spring 2026 and is currently running for the Fall 2026 semester – later in the day now, though, so thankfully there will be no more early morning commutes to class for Burieva.

The course combines educational lectures with engaging activities with the goal of teaching students about the behind-the-scenes of content creation, including editing, monetization, increasing community engagement, accepting collaborations, building a team and laws and ethics. 

One major draw to this course is the ability for students to learn by developing their own social media accounts. At the beginning of the semester, students are asked to pick a niche – anything the student is most passionate about – and create a TikTok and Instagram account dedicated to content surrounding that topic.

Kyle Blumenberg who took the class during its first semester and recently graduated with a sports management major said, “I love how [the course] makes me think more creatively.”

His classmate, senior communications major Luke Davis said, “We’re learning how to be established, create resumes and put our name out there.” 

Davis explained that because he posts every Sunday for class, he’s learned the most about the importance of consistency.

Senior sports management major Justin Soto agreed, and said that he’s really enjoying the class and the diverse knowledge that Burieva is teaching them, from résumé building to social media. 

By vlogging his daily life and even recording with his friends, Soto said, “It helps me be grateful for all of the little things I do throughout the day.”

As for Davis, exploring his niche of collectables through social media has helped him realize how important they are to him and what it means to decorate his room with them.

Mark Grabowski, Chair of the Communications Department at Adelphi (and Burieva’s former advisor and professor), said that Content Creation & Social Media Influencing is already one of the Communications Department’s most popular courses – filling almost immediately when it was first offered and even having a waitlist.

“Students are hungry for courses that take the platforms they actually use seriously, and faculty across the department have noticed the energy it’s generated,” he said.

On the integration of content creation into academia, Grabowski said that universities must evolve to stay relevant. “Universities can sometimes be slow to adapt, and I think we need to be more nimble and open-minded, willing to innovate and try new things,” Grabowski said.

He added, “Malika is helping us do that.”

Grabowski explained that since Burieva is an alumna, she is uniquely able to connect with her students. He said that as a student she was “poised and self-assured, but also warm, approachable and modest,” and that now, as a professor, Burieva “cares deeply about [her students] and puts tremendous preparation into her classes.”

With rapid technological evolution shifting the world into a digital landscape, Burieva shared a similar sentiment in that it’s becoming increasingly useful to teach content creation in universities. 

She said, “There’s so much to do with content creation – you can work at a marketing agency with content creation, you can work as a copywriter, you don’t necessarily have to do social media – you can be an editor, researcher, you can work with brands.”

Burieva explained that as a young content creator she had to figure out a lot on her own from editing tricks to increasing engagement. 

With this class, Burieva hopes that students can learn real skills from someone who has real experience in content creation in a hands-on, immersive way – and even set her students up for a successful career as influencers, if they choose to pursue that route.

To aspiring influencers she offered this advice, “Post the video.”