Evans, J. J., & Van Epps, A. S., & Smith, M. T., & Matei, S. A., & Garcia, E. (2015, June), A Transdisciplinary Approach for Developing Effective Communication Skills in a First-year STEM Seminar  Paper presented at 2015 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition, Seattle, Washington. 10.18260/p.23468

\bibitem{asee_peer_23468}
  Evans, J. J., \& Van Epps, A. S., \& Smith, M. T., \& Matei, S. A., \& Garcia, E. (2015, June), \emph{A Transdisciplinary Approach for Developing Effective Communication Skills in a First-year STEM Seminar}
  Paper presented at 2015 ASEE Annual Conference \& Exposition, Seattle, Washington.
  10.18260/p.23468

Jeffrey J. Evans, Amy S. Van Epps, Michael Thomas Smith, Sorin Adam Matei, and Esteban Garcia.  "A Transdisciplinary Approach for Developing Effective Communication Skills in a First-year STEM Seminar".  2015 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition, Seattle, Washington, 2015, June.  ASEE Conferences, 2015.  https://peer.asee.org/23468 Internet.  13 Jan, 2025

\bibitem{asee_peer_23468}
  Jeffrey J. Evans, Amy S. Van Epps, Michael Thomas Smith, Sorin Adam Matei, and Esteban Garcia.
  "A Transdisciplinary Approach for Developing Effective Communication Skills in a First-year STEM Seminar".
  \emph{2015 ASEE Annual Conference \& Exposition, Seattle, Washington, 2015, June}.
  ASEE Conferences, 2015.
  https://peer.asee.org/23468 Internet.  13 Jan, 2025

@INPROCEEDINGS{asee_peer_23468
author = "Jeffrey J. Evans, Amy S. Van Epps, Michael Thomas Smith, Sorin Adam Matei, and Esteban Garcia"
title = "A Transdisciplinary Approach for Developing Effective Communication Skills in a First-year STEM Seminar"
booktitle = "2015 ASEE Annual Conference \& Exposition"
year = "2015"
month = "June"
address = "Seattle, Washington"
publisher = "ASEE Conferences"
note = {https://peer.asee.org/23468}
number = {10.18260/p.23468}
}

TY  - CPAPER
AB  - A Transdisciplinary Approach for Developing Effective Communication                 Skills in a First Year STEM Seminar                                          Abstract      Many STEM graduates leave school academically prepared in their fields, however  business leaders have been stating that they often lack the more intangible qualities  such as teamwork, critical thinking, communication skills, and ability to manage in-  terpersonal relations. These are often referred to as ”soft skills”, yet they are tightly  coupled with professional performance. Futhermore, they are all connected to basic  communication skills, commonly referred to as oral and written communication, and  their close counterparts, listening and reading. Such skills are not only add ons to a  STEM job, they can make the difference between a successful and a failing career,  team, or even corporation. In the last decade there have been efforts such as those by  the Association of American Colleges and Universities (AAC&U) to advance broad-  based systemic innovation to build and sustain strong undergraduate education in the  STEM fields.      Our group is in the early stages of an innovative initiative to provide alternative  communication and humanities learning environments in STEM higher education.  The group consists of faculty from several academic units including liberal arts, li-  braries, and technology. One of the learning experiences currently being tested in-  volves the tight coupling of all forms of interpersonal communication, and information  literacy with technological concepts. These are integrated into a learning experience  aimed to develop the capacities of interpersonal communication and social and cul-  tural awareness in a seminar environment.      This paper will describe the design of a seminar learning experience called Cul-  ture, Communication, and Digital Narratives. On the surface, its purpose has the ap-  pearance of combining oral and written communication with information literacy and  technology. However the seminar is much more, promoting storytelling as a way of  thinking. Our value proposition is that artistic storytelling can help students learn, cre-  ate, and communicate. The goals of the learning experience include enabling learners  to more effectively discover creative ideas, understand themselves and other people  (audiences), and communicate about them in a storytelling fashion, using performa-  tive and mediated techniques. As such, we have created a transdisciplinary, studentand project-driven learning experience that enables students to communicate effec-tively, and function in a professional context.    All activities are structured into modules that combine oral, written, and performa-tive communication. Students are immersed in both classical and contemporary theo-ries and methods of communication. They learn on how to use ethos, logos and pathosoriented messages, in the manner prescribed by Aristotle. They learn how to usecultural and intellectual meta-thinking for avoiding ethnocentric and biased messageproduction. Students learn about these concepts by doing. They tell stories, engage inethnographies, critique email correspondence or creating arguments via oral, written,video and auditory production. All projects are evaluated through a continuous pro-cess of feedback. We do not use a traditional grading method, Instead, each projectcontributes to acquiring a specific set of competencies. When the project deliverablesdemonstrates that the competencies are mastered, students are awarded ”badges” thatcertify mastery. We adopted the successful Open Passport Badging System adapted byour university from the Open Badge Platform initiated by the Mozilla Foundation. Wewill describe our process of generating communication competencies from AAC&Uinspired rubrics, and how these were mapped to learning outcomes, learning activi-ties, and badges in the seminar environment. We will address the flexible strategiesneeded to manage the notions of time, place, or pace of learning. We will also presentour findings from our first cohort, currently immersed in the seminar learning envi-ronment. The paper will present our suggestions for improvements of the seminarlearning process.                                           2
AU  - Jeffrey J. Evans
AU  - Amy S. Van Epps
AU  - Michael Thomas Smith
AU  - Sorin Adam Matei
AU  - Esteban Garcia
CY  - Seattle, Washington
DA  - 2015/06/14
PB  - ASEE Conferences
TI  - A Transdisciplinary Approach for Developing Effective Communication Skills in a First-year STEM Seminar
UR  - https://peer.asee.org/23468
DO  - 10.18260/p.23468
ER  -