note from the chair

Initiative will prepare students for dynamic communication environment

By David Domke
Department Chair

In the past two decades we have encountered a communication revolution that is every bit as profound as—perhaps even more than—the introduction of television to the mass American public in the 1950s. What a time to be alive. What a time to teach about and study communication in all its contexts—from face-to-face interpersonal to public addresses to media messages in all their forms. Nothing about communication is static these days.

That’s the compelling news. Here’s the challenge that comes with it: This dynamic environment requires some new ways of preparing our students to become engaged citizens and successful professionals. I have heard this viewpoint from alumni, from community leaders who hire and interact with our students, and from our students themselves.

OK, we can do this. We need to do this.

This academic year, which launches next week, the Department of Communication will build a framework for Student Professional Development. This is our central initiative for 2010-11, and it builds upon several activities in the Department, including our highly successful student fundraiser that we launched this past April, Transforming Communities.

Our Departmental goal for professional development is to create a comprehensive framework that begins when students enter the major and builds over time with increasingly sophisticated professional experiences. In concrete terms, we seek to provide students with transformative learning opportunities that define, change, and inspire them while in the Department (that’s where our student fundraiser dollars go) and to help students build relationships and mature, professional habits that will provide them with a solid foundation when they graduate.

Included in this initiative will be:

• elevated faculty mentoring for students doing off-campus internships
• increasing engagement of alumni with current students
• a Departmental website featuring student work and portfolios
• multimedia workshops for students each quarter
• a dedicated Career Week in January
• a digital literacy initiative connecting UW students with high schools
• a one-credit Careers course each quarter

We are already doing some of these, but even in those instances we expect to make our approaches more effective by building a framework that envelops students from Day One and provides them with tools and a mindset to navigate a dynamic communication environment.

I have asked Professor Nancy Rivenburgh to lead this initiative, and she will be joined by me and several faculty, students, and staff in this work. We’re all in on this. I welcome, in fact I desire, input from our alumni and community partners. We want and need your ideas to build a 21st-century professional development framework.