Attending 'Fashion University' - NYTimes.com On Sunday, 525 high school and college students completed Teen Vogue's annual Fashion University, a weekend of fashion education for the next generation of Anna Wintours, Grace Coddingtons and Eva Chens. Attendees, up from 502 last year, came from throughout the United States and from 26 countries. Amy Astley, Teen Vogue's editor in chief, started the weekend by interviewing Grace Coddington, Vogue's creative director. Then in a boot-camp-like curriculum, students attended back-to-back classes and panel discussions hosted by prominent fashion professionals. Philip Lim, Chris Benz and Prabal Gurung were among the designers who spoke about breaking into the industry and the fundamentals of design, fashion photography, styling and retailing. The students also heard from the fashion bloggers Rumi Neely and Bryanboy. For the second year, I moderated the closing panel, "Fashion in the Digital Age." The panelist included: Danica Lo, executive editor of StyleBistro.com; the designer and social media maven Rebecca Minkoff; Huan Nguyen, head of brand partnerships for LOOKBOOK.nu; Nadia Hussain, the community manager at Polyvore; and Treena Lombardo, the fashion director of ShopBop.com. The hour-and-a-half conversation covered a range of topics, including each of the panelists' Web sites' or brand's social and digital approaches. Judging from students' questions, brushing up on social media etiquette, figuring out which social platforms were relevant and how to track your online brand's success were the topics of the day. The questions were far more precise than the usual "How do I break into the business?" One student asked a three-part question to each panelist about their brand/site's monthly unique visitors, whether or not they use Pinterest and how and whether their company has a Facebook app. Another student wanted to know whether she should eliminate one of her two personal online personas for fear of alienating a future employer. One of her personalities was reserved for fashion blogging; the other was other was for her social life. Ms. Lombardo issued sound advice: Don't tweet or publish anything that you think would embarrass your parents. Ms. Lo warned the young blogger of not losing or toning down now what may make her standout in the future. "What makes us different is what makes us special," she said. That can make you a very interesting candidate. Just before the students lined up for "graduation," Jason Wagenheim, Teen Vogue's vice president and publisher, took a moment to drive home a point that, regardless of how technologically savvy our culture becomes, nothing replaces the hand-written thank you card (sans emoticons). "Please just don't write, 'It was great to C U' when you sign the card," he said.