Mission Statement
Excellent communication skills are highly valued by employers. In this age of multinational corporations, businesses are looking for sales managers, executives, marketing specialists, personnel managers, accountants, finance specialists, and more who speak a second language. In addition, positions with non-profit organizations and various government agencies all encourage strong communication skills, second language abilities and a broad understanding of the global village in which we now live. The global communication major prepares students for a wide variety of positions and careers.
As technological advances bring the world’s peoples closer together, the ability to communicate effectively across cultures and languages is becoming increasingly valuable. The Department of Communication prepares students for this future by offering a major program in Global Communication. Students in this program acquire knowledge in language, face-to-face communication, culture, ethics, and world affairs.
In language courses, second language skills of speaking, listening, reading, and writing are developed through contextualized and theme-based units addressing current issues. Language skills in applied areas, such as business, translation, and healthcare and contemporary life are emphasized. In communication courses students focus on the understanding and skills necessary to accomplish relational and organizational goals, manage conflict, build interpersonal relationships, influence others, and interact effectively in diverse social environments. In culture courses, students learn about both general and specific cross-cultural differences as well as how to appropriately and effectively work with others who are culturally diverse. In ethics courses students study judgments of what constitutes ethical conduct in intercultural contexts and the reasoning behind these assessments. In world affairs courses students gain a broad perspective on large scale issues that influence a variety of international relations and specific regions of the world.
The major also involves an individual study practicum that requires the student to engage with a community cultural distinct from his or her own cultural community. Recent students have done their practicum in places such as, China, Germany, Peru, Jordan, France, Brazil, Japan, Taiwan, and Spain.
By participating in a carefully selected program of language, communication, philosophy and other interdisciplinary courses, students come to understand linguistic and social influences on culture, develop and learn about a variety of intercultural communication competencies, study the nature and importance of business ethics, and learn principles of communication skills appropriate for organizational and interpersonal settings. In addition, students focus on a particular culture of interest by developing a specific foreign language competency.
Enrollment in the major is limited and requires an application. If this program interests you, visit the Communication Department in Old Main 204 for more information.
Learning Objectives
The Global Communication major helps students prepare for living in a global society through meeting the following objectives.
Students will be able to:
- Demonstrate intercultural competence in a variety of situations.
- Demonstrate the ability to apply and explain a series of key concepts from their major areas of study (communication, language, culture, and ethics) to their personal experiences in intercultural environments.
- Ethically, critically and systematically analyze problematic messages within a global setting.
- Demonstrate communicative competence in a second language.
Data-Based Decisions
There have been many changes over the last three years. Below is a list of some of the most significant that input for our assessment process has influenced.
- Our assessment process brought to our attention that some aspects of the Global Communication Practicum (the capstone experience for this major) were confusing for our students, even though the general experience was extremely valuable. Over the last year the faculty tied to the Global Communication program met regularly and redesigned and simplified the practicum process. Essentially now students have three options that are clearly laid out in our program material. The forms and steps involved in the practicum have also been simplified. In addition, it used to be that we spread the faculty advising for these practicums across all of the departmental faculty (including languages) and not all of them were invested in this program, so we have made sure that only faculty completely invested in the program do practicum advising. We have also created a Canvas shell that all faculty and students working on their practicum are signed into. This shell has many useful examples and points of information that have greatly reduced the confusion that used to exist. We will continue to monitor this
- Based on the feedback related to which classes were working for students and which were not, we have revamped the requirements for this major. We still have a strong focus on intercultural relationships, but now we have emphasized the communication courses even more. Our review of the practicum papers we use in our assessment process and the alumni surveys indicated that this is where the key learning was taking place; plus as a department we had more control over these courses. So we reduced the number of courses outside of the department that were required and increased the courses internal to the department. We have refocused the communication courses around the core cultural classes and also three thematic areas (Interpersonal Communication, Public Discourse, and Organizational Communication). We have kept areas of strength related to ethics and advanced language skills.
Our regular assessment of how we are doing and listening to and evaluating our students has proven to be valuable to inform these changes.
Assessment Plan
We have taken this opportunity to relook closely at our previous assessment plan. As a result, we have redesigned the learning objectives and expanded some of the assessment tools we are now using. Much of our previous plan relied solely on student feedback and perceptions. We believe this is important, but the new plan adds some more direct measures. The data we report in other sections is based on the old information we have been collecting. New data will be gathered starting with the 2016-2017 academic year.
The Global Communication major helps students prepare for living in a global society through meeting the following objectives.
Students will be able to:
- Objective: Demonstrate intercultural competence in a variety of situations
Method of Assessment: This competence is demonstrated by the successful completion of a practicum, requiring work in an intercultural setting. This will be verified by a faculty advisor’s review of the experiences associated with the review through journal entries, discussion with supervisors associated with the student practicum and a final report by the student. We will also assess student perceptions of our success in accomplishing this objective through an alumni survey (see Appendix A).
Timing: Review is completed at the end of the semester the student enrolls in the practicum. - Objective: Demonstrate the ability to apply and explain a series of key concepts from their major areas of study (communication, language, culture, and ethics) to their personal experiences in intercultural environments.
Method of Assessment: This ability is demonstrated through the completion of the practicum paper (14-18 pages) designed to synthesize the student’s knowledge of concepts from the major of areas of study and the student’s personal experiences in intercultural settings. Each paper will be assessed using a version of the Intercultural Knowledge and Competence VALUE rubric designed by the Association of American Colleges & Universities. A score of 15 or higher on this rubric will demonstrate competence in this area. A copy of the rubric is provided in the Appendix B. We will also assess student perceptions of our success in accomplishing this objective through an alumni survey.
Timing: Collected each semester, when the student completes the paper. Data will be organized into a report each summer. - Objective: Ethically, critically and systematically analyze problematic messages within a global setting.
Method of Assessment: A sampling of advanced majors in the Advanced Global Communication Class will be evaluated on a final written assignment. Effectiveness in these areas is demonstrated by a student’s ability to score a 15 or higher using a version of the Global Learning VALUE rubric designed by the Association of American Colleges & Universities. We will also assess student perceptions of our success in accomplishing this objective through an alumni survey.
Timing: Each semester with senior students in the Capstone class. Results will be combined for each academic year. A copy of the rubric is provided in Appendix C. - Objective: Demonstrate communicative competence in a second language.
Method of Assessment: Students will be assessed using two rubrics (one for oral proficiency and one for written proficiency). These rubrics are adapted from the Common European Framework of Reference for Language Assessment. A copy of the rubrics is in Appendix D in this document. We will also assess student perceptions of our success in accomplishing this objective through an alumni survey.
Timing: These rubrics will be filled out for each student based on their advanced language classes and the results will be compiled each year.