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Guest post by Korina Gratton

Whether your goal is to market or inform, neglecting to include part of the population is a terrible idea. Yet, by using social media as the platform that you market and inform through you are failing to reach up to 14% of Canadians (Statistics Canada, 2012). These Canadians have disabilities (visual, hearing, mobility) and may use alternative devices (including screen readers) to navigate online.  Social media platforms including Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube were not initially designed to include people with disabilities. Although they have improved their services, using the accessibility tips outlined below will allow you to reach all parts of the population. Accessibility is the design of products, devices, services, and environments for people with disabilities.  Although there are many ways to provide accessibility, I’ve provided the easiest tips for the most popular social media platforms.

When you consider disabilities you’ll need to remember that disability is a larger definition than a person being blind or using a wheelchair.  The Ontario Human Rights Commission provides a full disability definition but a disability can include physical disability (blindness, lack of coordination, epilepsy, deafness, reliance on a guide animal, wheelchair or mobility device), mental impairment or developmental disability, learning disability or mental disorder.  These disabilities can be caused by birth defect, bodily injury, illness or age.

Overall Tips

1. Colour choices matter as 5% of the world’s population have colour blindness (Colour blind awareness, 2015). High contrast choices are also easier to read than low contrast. Stéphanie Walter explains Accessible and contrasted colour palettes in her blog.
2. When using hyperlinks, link the text that explains where you are going / what you are clicking on. Click here is not descriptive
3. Font types and size is important. CNIB describes print accessibilityin better detail but sans serif fonts with recognizable upper and lowercase like Verdana and Arial are good choices. Choose font sizes between 12-18 and make use of white space.
4. Put the person first with inclusive language (wheelchair user not confined to a wheelchair). UFV’s Accessibility Advisory Committee includes an inclusive language list in their annual report.
5. Add captions (also known as alt-text) to your photos and closed captions (subtitles) to your videos. Instructions are provided or linked below under each platform. Don’t know what to write for alt-text, check out the Definitive guide to the alt-text field by Catharine McNally.

FacebookTips

Provide alternative contact information in the About field

Add captions to your photos – I’ve created a video with instructions

Videos/AudioTips

Provide a transcript

Provide a link to an accessible version of audio/video

Youtube videos have a few options for captions but you must link to the video instead of adding it directly to Facebook

 Facebook’s accessibility page has additional tips and they appreciate feedback if you notice a place that they could improve. Facebook’s mobile site is also considered more accessible then the main site.

TwitterTips

Provide alternative contact information in the About field

Add prefixes to tweets with audio-visual content

• Photos: [PIC]
• Videos: [VIDEO]
• Audio: [AUDIO]

Include links to transcripts or accessible versions of audio or video

Twitter posted an accessibility blog post which outlines their updates. They also have an accessibility team called the @A11y team who you can tweet with about accessibility.

Twitter’s mobile version can be more accessible than the main site or Easy Chirp allows you additional accessibility option and will appear on regular Twitter site. Plume is an android app that gives you options to customize your Twitter feed.

On March 1, the Communications department is bringing Terry O’Reilly from CBC Radio’s Under the Influence, an internationally renowned marketer and radio host, to speak in the University of the Fraser Valley’s, President’s Leadership Lecture Series.

Terry’s accomplishments are extraordinary:
– Co-founder of Pirate Radio
– Hundreds of national and international awards
– Lifetime achievement awards from the American Marketing Association, the Advertising and Design Club of Canada, and the Television Advertising Bureau
– Host of CBC’s Under the Influence and Age of Persuasion
– Created campaigns for top brands, including Labatt, Molson, Tim Horton’s, Hudson’s Bay, and Pepsi USA to name just a few.

Terry’s talk is on the Power of Storytelling. This presentation is designed for anyone involved in marketing, public relations, public speaking( and just fine and fascinating facts). Need to spend some professional development money –  this is an excellent  opportunity for that too.

The lecture starts at 4pm and the Q & A will be finished by 6pm.

Tickets (click here for purchase)
Regular admission $35
UFV Alumni $30
Students (with ID) $10
Block of 10 tickets $300 (savings of $5 per ticket)
Block of 25 tickets $625 (savings of $10 per ticket)

Sponsorship
If you can’t attend but would like to sponsor UFV Students to attend the event, $100 will allow 10 students to attend. Tax receipts will be available for student support donations only.

For more information see www.ufv.ca/plls/terry, or email Samantha.Pattridge@ufv.ca or Marcella.LaFever@ufv.ca.

Communications Department members welcomed new and returning UFV students at the Student Union Society’s Clubs and Services Fair.

The Great Hall event on Tuesday, 12 January offered students a chance to find out about different associations and opportunities at UFV, and enjoy plenty of snacks, interactive activities, and giveaways.

Winners of the CMNS scrabble prize draw:

First prize. UFV Bookshop voucher ($25): Ryan Chowdbry

Second prize. Ticket to Terry O’Reilly: The Power of Storytelling event on Tuesday, March 1, 4:00-6:00pm in the Great Hall: Eugenia Luong

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Michelle Riedlinger (PhD, University of Queensland, 2005)  is an Assistant Professor in the Communications Department at the University of the Fraser Valley. She specializes in science and environmental communication and brings her communication consultancy experience to various subjects including academic writing, advocacy, grant writing and crisis communication.

Submitted by Sam Schechter

When a new national sensation sweeps through the collective consciousness of a generation, everything that unifies that generation seems to instantly make sense.

When Barack Obama pledged to bring hope to America, musicians, celebrities, and even well-funded admirers threw their voices, music, reputations, and money into the wave of enthusiasm and the logic of the campaign’s successful outcome seemed to speak for itself.

What happens in an election campaign, though, when there’s no new sensation? What happens when an election is just about the boring old future of our country and the unimportant state of our global environment and how our still-vital-but-not-sexy government programs and services are to be managed?

With a few ups-and-downs along the way, voter turnout has been declining in Canada since the 1950s, with people under the age of 30 being much less likely to vote than those over the age of 50.

But elections don’t just matter when there’s an Obama-sized wave sweeping across a nation.

Every election affects the future of our country, the state of our global environment, the laws by which we are governed, and the services governments do or don’t offer to assist their citizens.

Numerous efforts have been made to engage young voters and encourage them to vote, such as Rock the Vote, and the inclusion of youth wings in political parties, but they have experienced mixed results in terms of increasing voter turnout among young people.

Elections BC, the non-partisan government agency responsible for organizing elections in British Columbia includes voter education and outreach as part of its mandate. In an effort to help them develop new strategies for increasing voter turnout among youth, Elections BC has asked for help from UFV.

In response, UFV has created a new, interdisciplinary course: IDS 400: Youth in Electoral Politics. This course is designed to bring a group of university students together to provide strategic advice and insight to Elections BC that will help them achieve their goals.

This course is an exciting and interesting new educational model for UFV. It is being co-taught by six instructors from six different departments and it puts students in charge of the course’s outcomes. The work of the course isn’t just for the classroom; it’s for the benefit of Elections BC and the tens of thousands of young voters that they’re looking to engage in the provincial election scheduled for May 9, 2017.

This is completely different from every other course offered at UFV.

To quote the official course outline:

This course represents an important new partnership for UFV as a growing institution and a unique learning opportunity for students.

This course is something completely different and I am excited to be a part of it.

If you’re interested, I hope you join me.

Sam Schechter is an instructor in UFV’s Communications department and one of six faculty members collaboratively teaching IDS 400: Youth and Electoral Politics.

Tonight my intercultural communication class is taking on the topic of conflict and group dynamics in situations where there are a mix of cultural backgrounds. The installation of the new Canadian government, with its new makeup of gender balance, Francophone/Anglophone, First Nations, Afghani, Sikh cultural backgrounds (and more), got me thinking about what the cabinet might need to know about intercultural group dynamics.

The upside of a culturally diverse decision making group? BETTER DECISIONS.

The downside? A struggle to maintain good interpersonal relationships.

What should the cabinet do about it? Pay attention to building good RELATIONSHIPS with every meeting and through every decision.

How is this done when there are a variety of value hierarchies, worldviews, and communication expectations? Yes, communication is the key. Here are a few tips from researcher Stella Ting-Toomey, John Oetzel, and myself.

Knowledge: develop an in-depth understanding of important intercultural communication concepts (and understand our self first)

Check yourself: double-check our own assumptions and reactive emotions that we bring to a group situation

Mindfulness: Be a mindful interpreter of intercultural conflict (i.e. an opportunity not a dread)

Re-frame: create alternative contexts to frame your understanding of another person’s communication behaviours

Validate identity of other team members: Speak in ways that honour another person’s expectations for proper ways to discuss and make decisions

Manage facework: use communication strategies that validate other party’s social self-esteem and social self-worth.

Power balancing: Concentrate on empowering members who have historically had little or no access to voice

Use collaborative consultation: use process that recognizes that diversity in decision-making results in a higher quality decision

Build new communication structures: Don’t do something just because that is the way it was always done. Maybe try a talking circle instead of Roberts Rules of Order.

Adaptability: Don’t be prescriptive in the systems used for making decisions. If something isn’t working, go at it a different way.

RELATIONSHIP: At every step, meeting, and decision point ask “What have we done that enhanced or inhibited relationship building?”

All the best to you Prime Minister Trudeau and your new cabinet.

For further reading check out the following resources.

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Reading List

Domenici, K. & Littlejohn, S.W, (2006). Facework: Bridging practice and theory. Thousand Oaks, Sage.

LaFever, M. (2008). Communication for public decision-making in a negative historical context: Building intercultural relationships in the British Columbia treaty process. Journal of International & Intercultural Communication 1(2), 158-180

LaFever, M. (2009). 9P Planning. Overcoming Roadblocks to Collaboration in Intercultural Community Contexts. Proceedings: International Workshop on Intercultural Collaboration (IWIC). International Conference; Stanford University, Palo Alto, CA

LaFever, M. (2011). Empowering Native Americans: Communication, planning and dialogue for eco-tourism in Gallup, New Mexico. Journal of International & Intercultural Communication 4(2). 127-145.

Lederach, J. P. (2003). The little book of conflict transformation. Intercourse, PS: Good Books.

Ting-Toomey, S. and Oetzel, J. G. (2001). Managing intercultural conflict effectively. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

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Dr. Marcella LaFever (University of New Mexico, 2005) is an Associate Professor in the Communications Department at the University of the Fraser Valley. She specializes in intercultural communication and brings that expertise to various subjects such as communication for workplace, instruction, social media, team and public speaking contexts.

Thank you to former UFV student Charlene Leon* for inspiring me to investigate the use of the place of the Medicine Wheel in the scholarship of teaching and learning. I have been working on this  project for four years and this month, on November 13, I am presenting a four domain model at the Symposium on Scholarly Inquiry into Teaching & Learning Practice in Vancouver, BC. This model is meant to assist curriculum designers to develop course outcome statements that honour learning needs across the physical, emotional, mental and spiritual and to support the efforts to Indigenize the Academy; making post-secondary education more culturally inclusive.

The framework expands the three domains of learning, pioneered by Bloom (1956) to a four domain construction based on the four quadrants of the Medicine Wheel (Bopp, Bopp, Brown & Lane, 1984), a teaching/learning framework that has widespread use in the indigenous communities of North America (Native American, First Nation, Metis, Inuit, etc). This model expands on the cognitive (mental), psychomotor (physical), and affective (emotional) domains to add the fourth quadrant, spiritual, as being essential for balance in curricular design that supports students in their learning goals. The description of the spiritual quadrant includes a progression of learning outcomes and suggested verbs for developing learning outcome statements.

The basic idea of the learning domain as pioneered by Bloom is that the learner builds from a foundation of knowledge or skills to higher order processes. For example, in the cognitive or knowledge domain, moving from recall to comprehension to applying the knowledge, analyzing the result, and then creating something new based on that analysis.

In the affective (emotion) domain, the one most closely related to spiritual perhaps, the progression goes from receiving stimuli, to responding to the stimuli, to valuing the experience, to internalizing the values and beliefs and behaving in a way that expresses that belief and value system. It is possible to argue that the affective domain includes emotional and spiritual, especially in light of the inclusion a value and belief systems. However, even if this were the case the spiritual is certainly not balanced with physical, mental, and emotional as it is in the four domain configuration of the medicine wheel.

As in the literature on the three learning domains, I offer some possibilities for sample verbs that can assist curriculum designers in creating outcome statements that will help in realizing success in including spiritual outcomes in lesson plans.  The samples are meant to bring out the intent of each step in the progression of spiritual growth and maturation, but are not not meant to be definitive or to exclude other possibilities. For example outcome come statements in a group communication course that works across the progression might go something like this: a) Be aware of the emotional needs of other group members; b) Acknowledge that others feelings and desires are as important as your own; c) Work with group members to create an atmosphere that supports everyone’s input to a project; d) Advocate for group members when you see that they are not being heard; e) Remain committed to the completion of your group’s project.

Bloom, B.S. (Ed.). (1956).Taxonomy of educational objectives handbook I: Cognitive domain.
New York: David McKay.
Bopp, J, Bopp, M., Brown, L. & Lane, P. (1984) The sacred tree: Reflections on Native American spirituality. Twin Lakes, WI: Lotus Light.

*Charlene Leon is a community helper, educator, activist, mother and grandmother and resides in British Columbia. She is Anishinaabe kwe and comes from the Peguis First Nation in Manitoba. She received her BA Adult Education degree at University of the Fraser Valley, BC in 2010. She recently received her Master in Social Work at Wilfrid Laurier University in Ontario, 2013. She has committed her life to truth and reconciliation of herself, her family and communities in the healing and recovery from colonial trauma and the aftermath and impacts of the Indian Residential School system. She is a first-generation survivor of the Indian Residential School system where her mother and grandmother attended in Manitoba for several years. Leon has worked with several Indigenous organizations over the past 25 years, both on and off reserve in the field of social service, education and in the private sector. She strives to incorporate Indigenous tradition and wholistic healing approaches and the application of this knowledge with diverse and generalist practice contexts.

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Dr. Marcella LaFever (University of New Mexico, 2005) is an Associate Professor in the Communications Department at the University of the Fraser Valley. She specializes in intercultural communication and brings that expertise to various subjects such as communication for workplace, instruction, social media, team and public speaking contexts.

Lindsay Lindholm’s project, “Urban vs. rural opinion toward B.C. Agricultural Land Reserve legislation: An analysis of comments on online news stories” was recognized for research excellence at the Monday June 1, 2015 awards dinner. An invitation to the dinner, an event hosted by the University of the Fraser Valley’s Research Office, is much coveted by students, faculty, and administration among the plethora of year end activities. This year’s did not disappoint.

Lindsay has a love for learning and is entering her fourth year of the Bachelor of Arts program, pursuing a major in Political Science, a minor in Communications and a certificate in Adult Education. She previously obtained a Diploma in Horticulture specializing in Greenhouse and Nursery Production (thus her special interest in the agricultural land reserve), and a certificate in Computer Information Systems. Lindsay states that “The research project allowed me to utilize my combined educational interests while developing my most valued skills of communications and research. I would like to apply my education to a career in the field of Agriculture with particular interest in agriculture education and public policy.”

In the report, originally developed as part of her Professional Formal Research Report Writing class (CMNS 351) Lindsay analyzed reader comments to online news articles about proposed amendments to the British Columbia Agricultural Land Reserve (ALR) as they were approaching a province-wide referendum vote in 2014. The amendments divided the ALR into two zones that allow farmers in one Zone to supplement farming income with non-agricultural land use such as oil and gas, the other would allow greater leniency for development. British Columbians voiced their opinions towards the changes through social media in online commenting forums that followed the online news. Lindsay decided to look at whether there were opinion differences based on whether the articles and commenters were in an urban or a rural area. She compared the opinions of people in urban Metro Vancouver and rural agricultural communities of the Fraser Valley.

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Dr. Marcella LaFever (University of New Mexico, 2005) is an Associate Professor in the Communications Department at the University of the Fraser Valley. She specializes in intercultural communication and brings that expertise to various subjects such as communication for workplace, instruction, social media, team and public speaking contexts.

At the February meeting of the Professional Writers Association of Canada (Fraser Valley chapter) local freelance writer, Ronda Payne shared her top tips for pitching to magazines. Here are the top ten:

1. Start with what appeals. Ronda says that she’s motivated to tell a good story. She keeps a copy of Roald Dahl’s Charlie and the Chocolate Factory on her desk to remind her to stay inspired to create places where other people want to go.She suggests starting with stories that you like to write and then making a list of places where it makes sense to publish those stories. She recommends reading The Magazines Associations of BC and the Best of the Magazine Markets for Writers. What do you know a lot about? If you can think of a topic, then there will a magazine for it. For example, Canadian Thoroughbred, Food and Wine Trails, and The Southern Review.
2. Look for opportunities everywhere. Tell your family and friends that you are writing for a living, says Ronda. She sees every meeting as an opportunity for work. She told a story about how she has been joyfully writing for Country Life in BC for the last five years because of a chance encounter at a Chamber of Commerce event. Then, at a Pacific Agriculture Show event, she met the publishers of Modern Agriculture and started writing for them. Connect with other writers – get to know them. They might have work opportunities that suit your skills better than their own.
3. Do your research. Ronda advises writers to check online to see what the magazine is already publishing. What can you add? Look editors up online. Check out the Editor’s blog for likes and dislikes. Look at back issues for the style. Show that you care. Writers that are consistently employed are thoughtful—and read the guidelines.
4. Respect deadlines. Magazines can be deadline driven so Ronda recommends working out what is feasible for you. Get your interviews done early so you aren’t relying on other people to meet your deadlines.
5. Do it all. Magazines writers need to be able to talk to people to bring out a story, put together random facts in an interesting way, and take good pictures. Ronda emphasizes asking questions that help find a good story. The story may not be the one that someone wants to tell. But tell the truth, she says. Get to the truth. Why does this matter? Why should people care?
6. Ready, Set, Pitch! Ronda recommends going to the magazine’s website and following the guidelines. And then following the guidelines. And then following the guidelines. She says that writers might need to pitch a Christmas story in Jan/Feb so it’s important to learn the business. Be creative and honest. She also recommends building relationships so that pitching isn’t such hard work. Formal pitches get you in the door, she says, but if you are still making formal pitches in six months it might be time to move on.
7. Draw the line on what you will and won’t do. Ronda was passionate about writing for Modern Dog but they wanted her to do it for free. She tried to negotiate but they weren’t interested. Will you write for a byline? How much do you need to survive as a professional writer? Most magazines don’t pitch a rate but $25c/word is average (or $200 for 500 words).
8. Grow a thick skin and let it go. There will always be someone who doesn’t like what you’ve written, Ronda says. Their feedback will help you improve as a writer, regardless. Be gracious when you are asked to make changes. If the editor says, “I like it better that way” then recognize that it’s theirs to tweak.Consider, “What hill do you need to die on?” Do your best, then drink wine. Do your job, not the editors. Submit it and then don’t sweat it. Don’t read it again when it comes out.
9. Get the most out of it. Ronda says all freelance copywriters need to know about Access Copyright. They pay writers for things that they have written where they hold the rights. It’s worth looking up, she says.
10. Watch for pitfalls but love your job. It’s a flaky business, Ronda says. Sometimes stories don’t run and there’s no kill fee. It’s tiring and deadline driven. Deadlines overlap and pay can be slow. Contracts and rights can be hard to negotiate. It’ll take you away from other, longer projects like a book.But writing for magazines is incredibly rewarding. Creating feelings in readers and inspiring action. Magazine writers help change the world in small ways. It isn’t for everyone but…

“… it’s the writer’s life for me,” sings Ronda.

The students in Communications 180, Introduction to Intercultural Communication, found out a bit of the answer to that question during the Fall 2014 term at the University of the Fraser Valley. At first it seems strange, but in order to really understand the impact of culture on communication every individual needs to start with learning about themselves; their values, worldviews, beliefs, ways of behaving and how such things were passed down to them across generations. Then you might actually be able to see yourself as someone else perceives you.

There is, of course, much more that goes on throughout the semester. The ultimate goal is to be able to set aside your own ingrained ways of judging the world; to take a step back and understand that just because you were always taught that something was the “right” way to communicate, it doesn’t mean that every other culture that does things differently is “wrong.”

The class had some fun with their culminating research and presentation. The task was for each learner to spend three hours in a public place, such as a mall or a park, and just observe everything that was going on around them. They observed the environment, the clothing, the demographics of the people in that space at that time, and ultimately the interactions going on around them. They took whatever notes they could, with a proviso to write descriptions not judgements. When they came back to class they were counted off into five groups and shared their notes with each other, looking for common threads among all the pooled information. Then, they had to come up with a creative way to tell the rest of the class what they had learned about Canadian culture.

One group found that wherever they went there were people having very loud conversations about very private matters. They entertained us with some skits. Another group took us into a restaurant and demonstrated the gamut of what they had observed servers having to put up with, not the least of which was some fairly blatant misogyny. I have to confess, the one I enjoyed the most (and I think the class did too) was the group where each member created a poem about how typical Canadian seating arrangements and room design had an impact on communication. We were treated to a poetry reading with projected images of the spaces and the snapping of our fingers between the delivery of each poet’s creation. It won’t be the same but check out the SlideShare above to get a little taste of what they saw.

I am certain that the next time somebody is discussing Canadian culture it won’t be about hockey and politeness for these students.

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Dr. Marcella LaFever (University of New Mexico, 2005) is an Associate Professor in the Communications Department at the University of the Fraser Valley. She specializes in intercultural communication and brings that expertise to various subjects such as communication for workplace, instruction, social media, team and public speaking contexts.