The future of public communication of science and technology

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All in the name of science

All in the name of scienceDoes science communication have a place in the university? I briefly interrupted my search for the best gelato in Florence to contemplate this question during a session at the 2012 Public Communication of Science and Technology Conference. While Bruce Lewenstein from Cornell University, Suzanne de Cheveigne from CNRS in France, and Brian Trench from Dublin City University didn’t reach agreement on this topic, the lively discussion prompted me to consider my own position as a science communication researcher, practitioner, and teacher at UFV.

When I consider the environmental problems facing us in the Fraser Valley – including declining salmon populations, water availability, and a proposed expansion of a pipeline pumping tar sands oil through our region – I realize that science communicators are in positions to influence how people respond to health concerns, our environment, technology uptake and careers in science.

Brian Trench argued that the public communication of science and technology belongs at the university because it is already part of undergraduate and postgraduate programs, including Dublin City University’s Masters of Science Communication Program. Trench speculated on whether science communication will survive as a distinct field; its interdisciplinary nature makes it unique but also vulnerable without a key discipline to support it.

I found myself nodding in response to Suzanne de Cheveigne’s comments that knowledge only comes with specialization. Science communication researchers use tools from a wide variety of disciplines: communication studies, sociology, history, psychology, and philosophy. It is important for researchers to know and use these tools well, gaining expertise that only comes from in-depth study into each area.

Bruce Lewenstein argued that science communication doesn’t necessarily belong at the university but in institutions that work between the intersection of science and the public, such as San Francisco’s Exploratorium. Science communication has traditionally been an importer of ideas from other disciplines rather than an exporter, but its focus on the boundary between theory and practice in engaging publics makes it unique.

I saw evidence of this combining of theory and practice everywhere at the conference, with researchers, journalists, policymakers, and practitioners for science museums contemplating new science communication work from a range of perspectives including values, aesthetics, notions of the sublime, ethics of science communication, and the constitution of publics. So, while establishing academic credibility may be important (I met a new crop of researchers with PhDs in Science Communication), for me science communication’s real value remains in its goal to make science accessible to everyone.

This emphasis on accessibility means considering science communication’s place not just at the university but in all levels of government, in the press, within secondary education and informal education institutions, and so on.

Filled with new enthusiasm and insights into the role of science communication in society, I can return to my other quest for superlative gelat0. Already I can report that if you are ever in Florence, you owe it to yourself to visit Grom, but I’ll keep you posted about any other great locations my search uncovers.

CMNS degree survey results and draw prize winners

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In February the Office of Institutional Research released an online survey to find out if there was interest among UFV students in a Communications degree.

We’re very grateful to the large numbers of respondents who took the opportunity to share their thoughts. In all we had over 600 responses to the survey, with over a third indicating they would be “Interested” or “Very interested” in pursuing a degree in Communications. With that enthusiastic support we’ll continue developing the full degree proposal.

We had offered as enticement the chance to win UFV Bookstore gift certificates for survey respondents, and here are the lucky winners:

$50 certificate – Janelle Harder

$25 certificate – Robin Anderson

$25 certificate – Cindy Cooper

Congratulations to the lucky winners, and thanks again to everyone who took part in the CMNS survey.

CMNS 390 students present documents to UFV staff in end-of-term briefings

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What information does the reader need? What’s the best format to deliver it? These were the essential questions that students in CMNS 390: End-user Documentation Design worked on answering over the Winter 2012 semester in hopes of making the lives of UFV students easier.

This past Wednesday UFV staff from Student Life, Advising, Student Services and Arts Advice were invited to attend document release briefings to ask questions, provide feedback and consider adopting the documents as part of the UFV retinue.

Four student teams, after participating in a focus group session at the beginning of the term, decided to design documents titled:

  • How to $ave Money: A UFV Guide
  • Healthy Eating on an Unhealthy Budget
  • A Practical Guide To Your Degree At The University Of The Fraser Valley
  • Getting Involved at UFV

Kudos to the students on their excellent documents and presentations:

Cameron Cal, Allyssa Epp, Nader Hussein, Anusha Iyengar, Clair Jensen, Jacqueline Klassen, Mitchell Lock, Jillian Lowe, Tammy Macadams, Cassidy Meadows, Maxwell Mooney, Leonard Naimi, Kacey Oravec, Jonathan Vandermey, Jessica Webster.

 

CMNS student Leonard Naimi set to give microlecture at March 29 Student Research Day

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leonard

leonard The Communications Department is proud that one of our students is taking the plunge to show off his talents in this week’s Student Research Day. One of 20 students giving microlectures, Leonard Naimi will be speaking about his directed studies research titled “The Baha’i Faith’s Approach to Intercultural Communication and Peace Practices: A Comparison to Current Conflict Theory”. With only three minutes to talk about what he has discovered, we know it will be a bit of a daunting task. However, we’re not too worried because, as the winner of the 2011 CMNS 235 Toastmasters scholarship, we know he can do it. In a few months Leonard will be graduating from UFV with a BSc in Chemistry and a minor in Communications.

When asked what motivated him to take so many Communications courses Leonard replied, “I believe it was sometime in my third year when I decided that a minor would help me finish my requirements for the BSc much sooner than I would without one. I felt that, rather than doing a minor only for the sake of finishing my BSc sooner, I would do one that would help me become a better Chemistry high school teacher. As a result, Communications seemed like the perfect fit as it has helped me become both a better speaker and writer.”

Come on out to Student Research Day to celebrate all of our UFV student researchers and make a special point of coming between 11:30 and 12:30 to hear the microlectures. Congratulations to Leonard and, btw, we think he should go on to graduate school.

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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.

Be Cognizant of Your Interlocutors*

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(*”know your audience”)

Big words have their place in communication, but it’s always worth reflecting on the purpose of those long latinate locutions* (*”big words”). Do they add precision to the point, or are they just props shoehorned into sentences to make the writer seem more knowledgeable? In this short video presentation, copywriter Terin Izil makes the pitch that bigger is not necessarily better when you are reaching for “le mot juste”.

Click the image to view the presentation:

Communications research excellence: Yes we can!

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The Communications Department is gearing up to select the best CMNS paper submitted in the last twelve months. The winning submission will receive a Research Excellence Award, worth $1,000.

Are you a full-time student this semester, or were you a full-time student in Summer/Fall 2012? Did you take (or are you taking) CMNS courses, especially CMNS 155, CMNS 412, or CMNS 490? Did you write a really strong paper in a CMNS course that accomplished any of the following?

  • established the current state of knowledge on a topic/area
  • identified a gap in the existing literature
  • filled that gap with evidence or rational argument
  • interpreted the findings/evidence, generalized it for wider applicability, or demonstrated how it could be used in applied communication practices
  • identified limitations and future work to be done in the area.

If you wrote a paper for a Communications course last year that fits in one or more of the above categories (or you know another UFV student who did), you may want to ask your instructor to nominate the paper for the University’s Research Excellence award.

Don’t be shy. If you are really proud of a paper or report you completed for a CMNS course, or you were really impressed by the work one of your classmates did, let your instructor know that you think that work should be recognized.

Instructors in the Communications Department will be submitting their nominations on Tues, April 17, and then arm-wrestling to determine which submission is the best…. (No, we don’t do that! In fact, a committee will carefully measure each submission to see which one best represents the department and the communications discipline, and that paper will be forwarded as the department’s selection for the Research Excellence award.)

Cell Phone Etiquette in 2012

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“It is customary nowadays to deplore the fact that the art of letter-writing has fallen into decay, and when we read that the entire correspondence of an engaged couple recently was carried on for two years by telephone and telegraph we are inclined to believe it.”

 — Lilian Eichler, Book of Etiquette Vol. I, 1924

“Etiquette” is a word with prissy connotations, recalling books with chapters on how to behave at tea parties, the most acceptable way to decline a wedding invitation, and so on. But conventions govern all our social interactions whether we like it or not, and an enormous amount of information is communicated by the way we “comport” ourselves with other people. Simple example: an office romance was exposed at a group lunch when a person absent-mindedly plucked an olive off the plate of the person sitting next to them and ate it. If you take a piece of food off someone’s plate and eat it, you are communicating a LOT about your relationship with that person.

The thing about rules of etiquette is that they evolve by consensus and over time. Social norms around eating, for example, have had millennia to develop. When rapid technological change affects people’s behaviour it’s hard for the conventions that help us negotiate our interactions (in a word, etiquette) to keep up. The proliferation of cell phones is one example, as anyone who has watched someone take a phone call in a movie theatre will understand. (Pro tip: do not answer your phone at the movies.)

I’ve noticed that no widely-accepted norms exist for cell phone behaviour when you’re in the company of other people. Is it considered rude to interrupt a f2f conversation to take a call, for instance? (I did an informal census, only to learn that opinions differ widely.) What about sending a text message or three, or checking Facebook updates, or replying to email? As the communication instruments in our hands gain functionality, how do we balance the demands of the device against the social expectations of those who are literally in our faces?

I’m not sure if this will catch on, but a recent attempt to introduce some cell phone etiquette to social situations, called “Don’t Be a D*ck During Meals“, has gone a little bit viral on the Internet. The basic rules are simple: when you’re at a restaurant with friends or family all cell phones go in a pile in the middle of the table. The first person to touch their phone before the bill arrives has to pay for everyone. If no one succumbs to the urge, the bill is divided up as per usual social conventions.

I’d be interested to hear what you think of this “game”, as well as the rules and conventions you observe when it comes to your cell phone behaviour in public, with friends or with family.

cell-phoners

Student Survey

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Communications department student survey & prize draw

The Communications department is looking for student input into their degree proposal plans. Please take five minutes to complete the survey at the link below, and then if interested you can enter to win one of three gift certificates from the UFV bookstore.

http://bit.ly/cmns-survey

The survey and contest end on Fri, March 9.

Profile of new Journalism course in the Cascade

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UFV Cascade contributor Tanya Ruscheinski reports on a visit from CTV reporter Jonathan Woodward to the CMNS/JRNL 301 classroom. The course, Advanced Practice of Journalism, is one of the courses that make up the Introduction to Journalism Certificate. Established three years ago, the certificate will be awarded to several UFV graduates for the first time at Convocation this year.

Abbotsford goes to Albuquerque

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Greetings from New Mexico and the annual conference of the Western States Communication Association. Don’t be too jealous. It has been windy and cold in the high desert, making me happy that I brought my good, Canadian winter coat. On the other hand, the days have been warm inside while meeting colleagues, hearing about teaching practices, and representing the University of the Fraser Valley in two research presentations.

One interesting teaching practice that both faculty and students may enjoy bringing to CMNS 235, Oral Communication, is the idea of using music to segue from speaker to speaker. Patricia O’Keefe from the College of Marin asks each student in her oral communications class to pick a song that they want to use as their theme for the semester. Throughout the semester, various classmates act as the “DJ” who spins the “anthem” as the student walks up and prepares to present. Pat says this practice has had a phenomenal effect in calming nerves and creating community. A song she particularly liked was Andy Grammer’s “Keep Your Head Up.” Leave a comment and let us know what you think about this strategy.

In preparation for this conference I had the pleasure of organizing two panel presentations that ended up garnering lively discussion. The first panel (at 8 o’clock on a Monday morning I might add) was titled, “A roundtable on theory-to-practice: Applied Communication for social change.” Dr. Avinash Thombre (seated in the centre of the above photo) started the session off explaining a project sponsored by the U.S. State Department that brought university students from Pakistan to Little Rock, Arkansas to learn about the democratic process. His role was to help them understand Diffusion of Innovation theory in thinking about how they could use their knowledge once they returned to their homes. This presentation was followed by Christine Hollis (seated right), the Director of a program called “Kids Count” (New Mexico Voices for Children) who spoke about the use of a variety of message design theories that her organization had used to try to persuade state legislators to increase funding for early childhood education. To wrap up the presentations and lead into discussion, I presented a piece on the use of my 9P planning model in the 2011 “Appreciating You and I” community dialogues organized by Abbotsford Community Services. The audience was enthusiastic about the topic; their questions and comments about their own experiences took us right up to the closing minutes and were brought to a close by people trying to get into the room for the next session.

The second panel I had the pleasure of organizing continued the conference theme of social change but concentrated on bringing social change to the post-secondary classroom through the use of culturally responsive teaching practices. I had the pleasure of talking about UFV’s efforts to indigenize, and my own research on reconciling instructional communication theory between the use of Bloom’s three “learning domains” and the four quadrants of the medicine wheel. Elizabeth Root from Oregon State University explained how she created a program to pair her intercultural communication students with international students on campus. Kris Kirschbaum, who experienced her own culture shock in taking a faculty position in North Carolina, talked about similar issues of working with students who had very little experience outside of their own communities and helping them to understand cultural differences and similarities. The fourth speaker, Willow Anderson, reinforced the Canadian presence on the panel. She traveled all the way from Newfoundland to talk about struggles in making sure that as instructors of oral communications we don’t focus exclusively on Aristotelian traditions of public speaking theory. This topic led to an especially lively discussion about alternative ways of configuring assignments and including choices for presentation rubrics. I am definitely going to bring some of these ideas back to discuss with my colleagues at UFV.

See you all soon!