"After all these years of planning ISUComm, we're finally testing
the program and its basic concepts. There's a certain gratification in
having the chance to present this innovative curriculum to Iowa State
students."
Michael Mendelson, professor of English and director of ISUComm, can take
a little satisfaction that after five years of planning, ISUComm is off
and running - at least at the pilot stage.
Last fall, Iowa State offered 11 pilot sections of the ISUComm equivalent
of English 104. This semester an additional four sections of the second
course (the ISUComm equivalent of English 105) are being taught by Mendelson,
Donna Niday, associate professor of English and director of First-Year
Composition, lecturer Jenny Aune and Ph.D. candidate Irene Faass.
ISUComm is a cooperative effort of the Faculty Senate, Vice Provost for
Undergraduate Programs and a consortium of communication faculty from
art and design, English, the Greenlee School of Journalism and Communication,
and speech communication.
"One of our premises is that students do best when they learn and
practice communication in all areas of undergraduate study, not just in
speech and writing classes," Mendelson said. "To make this happen,
faculty across the institution have spent years mapping out the principles
that will guide this initiative."
Meeting after meeting, symposium after symposium have led Iowa State to
this point - to what Mendelson calls the most comprehensive curricular
initiative in the University's recent history.
"Because communication abilities are crucial regardless of major,
ISUComm will touch every student on campus," he says. "But because
the initiative is campus-wide, there is also no model for how best to
proceed with program implementation. So we have developed this curriculum
with considerable caution and constant interaction with faculty from all
sectors of the institution."
ISUComm's initial genesis came through the Faculty Senate, who felt that
Iowa State undergraduate students' communication skills weren't what they
could be. This assumption was based on comments from employers of Iowa
State graduates and a survey of 1,200 Iowa State faculty members.
That survey indicated that while graduates were leaving Iowa State with
suitable content knowledge in their major area of study, their ability
to communicate that knowledge was, too often, less accomplished.
Curricular planning began in 2001, and some things immediately began to
become clear to planners who wished to better integrate communication
instruction across the curriculum.
"It only made sense at an institution of science and technology that
the technology of the information age should be integrated into the communication
component at Iowa State," Mendelson said. "At the same time,
faculty felt strongly that they didn't want attention to writing or critical
reading to suffer."
But faculty members involved in the pilot sections of ISUComm insist that
the new course is as attentive to writing as ever and it is not driven
by technology.
"The technology enhances the curriculum," said Niday. "We
may use computers daily but they don't dominate what we do. We have lots
of small group and large group discussions."
Now, instead of simply reading and discussing an assignment and then writing
an essay, students in the pilot sections might conduct an interview and
search the web for research information and graphics. Then they will produce
a written document combined with a brief oral presentation and a poster
or PowerPoint on the same topic.
The emphasis is on WOVE, the integration of written, oral, visual and
electronic communication.
"Faculty asked us to design a curriculum that provided our students
with the kind of communication experiences they will have in their working
lives. That means they need to be able to communicate in a variety of
media and settings, but without sacrificing the amount of writing and
critical reading that they have been doing," Mendelson said.
That multi-modal goal has been accomplished in the first pilot sections
of the ISUComm foundation courses, which are distinguished from their
English 104 and 105 counterparts primarily through their emphasis on WOVE.
"WOVE allows students to use their talents more," said Niday.
"Some students may have a definite strength in writing while others
may see themselves more adept at oral presentations. This allows students
to have a more positive attitude towards the entire course."
The spring semester pilot courses also have a centralized theme ("The
Informed Citizen") that each section emphasizes in an effort to enhance
the focus on liberal education at the entry level.
"This unified theme not only provides a continuity of content in
the course, but it also provides the benefits of a learning community
context for students in the pilots," Mendelson said. "All of
the pilots are taught at the same time and every two or three weeks all
four sections meet. We have group events, which allows us all to have
a sense of community beyond our single sections."
Students in the pilot course began the semester by looking at the 1969
moon landings and how informed citizens apprised themselves of the space
race between the United States and the Soviet Union. Students studied
a variety of perspectives on the space race and then created their own
presentations on a certain aspect of the moon landings. They wrote essays
on the topic, then developed poster presentations for display in one of
the joint sessions with students from the other sections.
A panel discussion was also held for the combined sections in mid-February
that featured a physicist, political scientist, legal expert and food
scientist.
Prior to the panel discussion, students developed questions and learned
how to engage in a dialogue at a public lecture. Even after the panel
was finished, Mendelson said the learning continued.
"The next day we couldn't stop the conversation in our classes on
the oral presentation styles of the faculty on the panel," he said.
"Most importantly, however, first-year students were exposed to a
variety of positions that represent the range of thinking about an important
historical event by scholars from multiple disciplines. The students loved
it, and they ended up asking our distinguished guests some very challenging
questions."
Another important component of ISUComm's pilot courses is the development
of an electronic portfolio that the students will be able to keep and
add to throughout their Iowa State careers.
Mendelson says students can include initial drafts of written and oral
presentations, peer responses to the work and final products that reflect
WOVE abilities in their electronic portfolio.
"If they include examples from all their assignments, at the end
of the semester they will have a repository of examples of their work
that will represent not just their written communication abilities but
also visual and electronic aspects of their work. This can includes charts,
graphs and illustrations, which many students will be asked to include
in their work as they progress to upper-division courses," he said.
"The objective of the ePortfolio will be to continue to include
examples of student communication activities throughout the rest of their
college careers. Then at graduation instead of saying ‘'I took these
classes,' students will have a portfolio that will display the full range
of their college communication work to show to faculty in their departments
and to employers when they look for work."
The initial ISUComm effort is not only offering pilot courses in the foundation
courses in communication. The ISUComm steering committee is also working
to support academic departments across campus as they plan their own approaches
to communication instruction in the major.
"It's not enough to say we all know communication is important,”"
Mendelson said. "In order to maintain the continuity of instruction
that students need to grow as communicators, they need to have the importance
of communication abilities reinforced through communication study at the
upper-division level. This means that communication education becomes
the responsibility of faculty across the entire curriculum."
One way this goal is being accomplished is through the support of ISUComm
communication consultants, an effort coordinated by Greenlee School of
Journalism and Communication faculty members Denise Vrchota and Mark Redmond.
There are eight faculty members involved in this program - threeoral communication
consultants, three written consultants and two visual/electronic consultants.
At present they are working with faculty in departments in four colleges
and will soon begin discussions with LAS faculty to determine how best
to serve that diverse college.
"Our responsibility is to work with faculty in other departments
to integrate WOVE into their curriculum," Vrchota said. "We
analyze what sort of communications expertise their students need for
academic and professional success. We look at what a particular department
is already doing, what they would like to do and how to get from here
to there."
According to Redmond, their efforts have evolved from the initial stages.
"We've changed our philosophy a little bit," he said. "We're
trying to make faculty aware that communication skills are not an extra.
Once we get them to appreciate that, then we can help them cover communication
skills in more of a strategic manner."
So what is the future of ISUComm?
The Faculty Senate has already approved the general principles governing
communication instruction according to the ISUComm model, and the Senate
is scheduled to review the pilot projects and the ISUComm consultants
next fall. By then the assessment of how effective the pilot sections
and consultants have been in their initial phases will be completed.
"We'll have lots of information that we will be able to examine and
analyze," Niday said.
Pilot courses and consulting activities will continue next academic year.
In the meantime, the teachers in the pilot sections, the ISUComm consultants,
and the more than 40 faculty across the institution who have been contributing
to the project over its four years of development are convinced that ISUComm
will offer Iowa State students something special.
"I believe in all those people who have devoted so much time to this
program," Mendelson said. "And as a result of their efforts
ISUComm will provide Iowa State students with communication instruction
unmatched by any institution in the country.
"Our graduates will be able to say not only that they received a
superior education in their major, but also 'I studied at Iowa State and
I graduated with superior communication abilities.'"
