Many student journalists choose the field of journalism and public relations because they want their life to have an impact. And teaching about engagement can help them in their desire to create change.

Research examining engagement tends to fall in three areas: 1) civic engagement, 2) student engagement and 3) employee engagement. Research definitions of engagement tend to reflect the aim of helping people to develop identity, learn how to participate and flourish as a community.

• “…having both a behavioral component, termed participation, and an emotional component, termed identification” (Finn & Voelkl, 1993; p. 249).
• “Civic engagement is any activity where people come together in their role as citizens” (Diller, 2001, p. 22).

In the field in journalism, educators have been criticized about teaching students about newsroom socialization rather than teaching them to tailor information to encourage citizens to participate. The intent of a liberal arts education was designed to nurture students to be problem solvers, creative thinkers, and critical scholars (Higginbotham 1961; Wick & Phillips, 2008).

As educators, we should critically evaluate whether our teaching efforts are helping to empower students to create public action and awareness. When teaching engagement, students should be asking themselves whether their efforts reflect a world they want to make and whether their efforts accurately represent people. Engagement has the potential to create a sense of connectedness and self-efficacy among humans, which can lead to loyalty to an individual and organization.

The cultivation of intellectual and critical thinkers starts with encouraging them to connect to people outside their usual social circles. Several organizational leaders are encouraging news reporters to connect their social media identities to stories, post requests for story ideas on social media channels and meet with online community members in a F2F environment.

The line between public relations and journalism is blurring. Both fields recognize the importance of relationships for future sustainability, however many public relations professionals understand the significance of relationships better.

Journalists often view themselves as serving specific communities. Researchers have often referred to community as a physical location. However, a community can refer to a geographic area or refer to a group of people with similar interests. The process of sharing information allows journalists to be more aware of the diversity of communities that exist.

It is important to have a plan in mind when crafting exercises that teach students about media engagement. I had spent fall semester 2011 structuring assignments for my spring 2012 honors Online Media class. I hope that sharing my plan will help or inspire other people to experiment.

In my Online Media class at Arizona State University, I taught social media, visual communication and coding… and time constraints would not allow the full experiment to take place. Time constraints are a common problem for educators who are digitally literate. In this post, I will discuss how I envisioned the assignment, what actually happened, and what how I would like to expand upon this experiment in the future.

The class final project theme centered on examining the meaning of hero. I specifically wanted students dissect the construct of hero. The group discussed and focused on nine sub-themes: 1) the philosophical dissection of the construct, 2) why we needs heroes, 3) superheroes, 4) video games, 5) children’s definition of heroes, 6) how other cultures define heroes, 7) musicians, 8) celebrities and 9) villains.

Plan for Engagement Experiment

First Day
I asked the mostly sophomore-level students to post their thoughts and reactions about The Hero Project to a Tumblr blog. I envisioned students sharing their personal thoughts on this blog throughout the semester. Blog posts can encourage classroom community and topic reflection. And I planned to share this blog on the final project website.

Second Week
Each student was to be responsible for a social media channel and one person was responsible with commenting on sites related to our niche. They were required to set up a social media profile, market the project, create content, connect with others with similar interests and promote the project following publication via their assigned channel. The setup portion of the assignment was to be due during the second week of the semester. The social media sites chosen were Tumblr, Twitter, Facebook, G+, Pinterest, Quora, Flickr, Delicious, and blog comments.

Third Week
On the Tumblr blog, each student shared the best practices for engagement related to their social media channel.

Sixth Week
We discussed the creation of a promotional video related to the project. I showed examples of videos in class for inspiration: Jacob’s Story, Will it blend?, Free Hugs and Bad Project. Based on Jacob’s story, the students thought it would be engaging to bring a white board to the streets asking people who their hero was and why. Two students did shoot the slideshow, however it was created at the end of the semester.

Eighth Week
The class of nine students was required to create a multimedia piece summarizing the effect their personal hero had on them. They were asked to interview their personal hero and/or interview themselves talking about their hero. I graded them on creativity and focus, rather than production quality. You can view their videos on their class Tumblr site. The majority of the class members voted that this were their favorite assignment of the semester. Here is some of their feedback:

• “Making this personal hero video was a very cathartic experience … I think it communicates the message I was going for and I would love to make it longer.”
• “We don’t often get the chance to express ourselves personally in journalism class, and I enjoyed being able to tell my own story for a change. I can’t wait to share this video with my dad. He had no idea while working on this that I was calling him my hero.”
• “No matter what grade I get, this will probably end up being my favorite assignment of the semester. It was deeply personal, and dug at the core of what makes who I am.”

I encourage educators to allow at least one assignment that challenges students to apply a different or more personal lens related to the class focus.

Fifteenth Week
The crew coded and created a website called The Hero Project. And they posted their final thoughts about the project on the Tumblr blog. Ideally, I wanted them to interact more in social media spheres, however I am quite proud of what they did accomplish.

The Future

Ideally, I would like to teach a class called “Engaging Communities.” In such a class, I would like teaching crowdsourcing/curation, engagement, search, alternative forms of storytelling, verification and much more.

My students did begin to understand that they need to learn how to connect their content to people in the online environment. I wanted students to post suggested hashtags, live Twitter feeds, live chats and Ustreams, social media share buttons near stories and create a resources page and sidebars to encourage people to engage the content offline and online.

I have accepted a position at Michigan State University’s School of Journalism for fall 2012. I am co-teaching and helping design a journalism capstone class in this department. Based on my experience with this experiment this past Spring semester, I am inspired to continue. Here are some of my plans for the fall semester course:

During the first week students, students will search social media channels and search engines for story idea inspiration around an assigned theme. Sites could include:

• Technorati, Google blog search, Alltop,
• Twitter search, Twitter discover,
• Storify,
• boardreader,
• Delicious, scoop.it,
• group/as, and
• YouTube trends or charts.

Students will pitch their ideas on a G+ class circle. They will then vote (+1) and comment critically on the ideas. They will be required to observe and create content for niche communities throughout the semester. Team members will also be required to create crowdsourced stories, experiment with storytelling and engage in niche communities throughout the semester.

When I taught at Bloomsburg University in PA, I noticed that students would grow creatively and intellectually when given the opportunity to express themselves. Several academic studies show that the desire to be creative is a top reason why many journalism students choose the major of journalism. This fall semester, I am assigning every student to visually summarize their interpretation of the team’s topic using multimedia. The multimedia piece could be a montage of feet or it could be them expressing their thoughts to the camera about the niche topic. The more creative projects will receive higher grades. They will embed the SEOed video on the team’s Tumblr blog. And I also plan to still have them create promotional videos.

My goal ultimately with these assignments is to send a message that I want them to approach journalism from different angles. Many educators spend a great amount of time telling them what is and what is not journalism. In my class, I want them to take risks that reflect their desire to inform, help and motivate people. Research in political communication and other fields has shown that mobilizing efforts do influence positive behavior within individuals. Thus, I want them to also think about how they can mobilize the public for civic good. To find inspirational examples of mobilizing efforts, one should look at historical newspapers of the underground press in the 1960s.

Some syllabi suggestions would be to: 1) assign a social media editor to team projects, 2) require research of a social media channel and formulating story ideas within the channels, 3) assign a crowdsourced assignment, 4) embrace personal expression and interpretation and 5) require public and private reflection.

To learn more about engagement, I suggest reading posts from Steve Buttry, Knight Foundation’s Engagement Commons or Howard Rheingold. And of course, here is my presentation and visit my teaching page for updates on my classroom experiments at Michigan State University.

And if you have questions or comments, please comment or email me at carp@msu.edu. And I want to thank the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication public relations and communication technology divisions for the speaking invitation (#AEJMC12 #prprofs) and my co-panelists @PRvolsProf, @jizaks, @abbylovett, @marcusmessner, @RedClayHound, Charles Lubbers and moderator @Gallicano.

I experimented with Google+ Hangout office hours this semester. However, the success of the experiment was lukewarm. I video chatted with a total of two students over the semester. I don’t believe new students feel comfortable video chatting with teachers. I think that there may be a greater likelihood that I will chat with former students more often than my present students.

But many students were logged into their Gmail accounts. Many students regularly text messaged me through GChat. They would ask about assignments or about my day.

Andrew Lih, a journalism professor at the University of Southern California Annenberg School of Journalism, uses Google+ Hangouts for weekly story meetings with students. He also speculated that interactions with students were minimal because the service was so new.

Here is some advice on how to Hangout:

1. First, you will need to set up and label a circle for your class.

2. Sharing your circle with your students is the easiest way to connect with the class which includes yourself. Students will have to label the shared circle.

3. Select “Start a hangout.” A post in the G+ feed will appear that indicates you are hanging out. You can control which circles of people you engage while hanging out.

There is a newer feature called “Hangout with extras.” You can add a document from Google Documents or Share a Screen from your computer. The Documents feature has potential because student teams or teacher and a student could edit a document together while they video chat.

Other academic uses for G+ Hangouts include requiring your students to hangout with niche communities related to a professional interest. I hear photographers regularly use G+. If you click the hangout icon on the left side panel, you can see that public hangouts exist. gphangouts also lists permanent and future hangouts.

Students could also embed an On Air broadcast adjacent to a story or blog post because they can record and upload a hangout to a YouTube account.  You could critique their interviewing skills with this exercise.

I will try Hangout office hours in the future. But I believe students prefer to meet in person when it is an issue of serious concern and they prefer to text when it is not.

Each year I encourage my students to visit sites that aggregate the latest web design trends in hopes that they will become inspired.

This semester appears to be the semester of the splash page. A splash page is a page that is typically taken up by an image. Many students recruited someone to take professional portfolio pictures of them. As you browse these sites, you will see many sites feature an image of the student with a quote adjacent to their image.

Feel free to comment on their sites or visit sites from previous semesters.

Section 1
Kelly Andersen
Tara Boyd
Caitlin Cruz
Harmony Huskinson
Olivia Khiel
Leila O’Hara
Torunn Sinclair
Preston Sotelo
Cassie Strauss

Section 2
Hayden Packwood
Erin O’Connor
Vanja Veric
David Sydiongco
Ali Lasch
Haley Buntrock
Michelle Rivas
Hannah Shive
Devin McIntyre
Samantha Koukoulas
Sebastian Zotoff
Sonya Chavez
Haley Madden
Monique Zatcoff
Charissa Heckard
Mohamud Ali
Charles Hall
Daniel Escobedo
Osej Serratos

I have accepted an academic position at Michigan State University in the School of Journalism, and I am excited to engage with the professors and students intellectually.

I am saying goodbye to the past five years at Arizona State University, but I most sad to say goodbye to my students. My students handed in their final projects last night.

This is a note to them:

As a teacher, I have several goals for you: increase your confidence, help you find your creative self and understand the importance of relationships.

Most students do not believe at the beginning of my class that they can handle learning social media, multimedia and coding. At the end of the semester, many of you were teaching students in other classes.

Each person is able to do anything if they work for it. You will discover that skills are only a small part of your future success; the most important part of the equation for your future is developing a work ethic.

In the future, I plan to develop more exercises that allow students to tap into their creative selves. Through this exploration, you better discover your many sides and potential. I hope that you will continue to experiment and challenge ways to share and communicate information.

Most teachers at ASU are only able to work with students during one semester. This means that students are less likely to develop relationships with potential mentors. I want you to seek out people who will challenge and critique you. It is the most efficient path to professional success. It is important to develop relationships with people in the administration, with leaders at your jobs or internships and with other professors.

Many of you have learned that your classmates are resources as well. Remember, the bonds developed in my class do not have to end. You can connect with your classmates again to create another product together.

My professors are the reason that I became a professor. They helped me see my potential. I owe them so much for their kindness and time. And I am still here to help you.

I saw many of you became teachers in this class and previous classes, which means you are leaders. And I hope that with what you have learned you are better able to follow your passions and be happy. I firmly believe you can have it all.

Serena

Online Media 1:30 section
Kelly Anderson
Tara Boyd
Caitlin Cruz
Harmony Huskison
Olivia Khiel
Leila O’Hara
Torunn Sinclair
Preston Sotelo
Cassie Strauss

Online Media 4:30 section
Erin O’Connor
Charissa Heckard
Charles J. Hall
Mohamud Ali
Vanja Veric
Haley Madden
Ali Lasch
Haley Buntrock
Hayden Packwood
Osej Serratos
Sonya Chavez
Hannah Shive
Devin McIntyre
Samantha Koukoulas
Michelle Rivas
David Sydiongco
Monique Zatcoff
Daniel Escobedo
Sebastian Zotoff

I try to identify and share recent syllabi that I believe would be of use for the academic community. I know many educators are working on their syllabi over winter break. If you have one you would like to share related to digital media topics, email me or post it below.

I have also posted other syllabi in previous posts. Be sure to browse those posts as well.

Tim Currie | University of King’s College | Audience and Content Strategies
Marcus Messner | Virgina Commonwealth University | Reporting for Print and Web and Business of Media
Susan Currie Sivek | Linfield College | Introduction to Mass Communication

Keith Hampton | University of Pennsylvania | Five Digital Media and Social Network Classes
Zizi Papacharissi | University  of Illinois at Chicago | Democracy in a Digital Age
Columbia Graduate School of Journalism | Social Media Skills for Journalists
Mark W. Smith | Central Michigan University | Social Media and Journalism
Bill Handy | Oklahoma State University | Social Media

Cindy Royal | Texas State University | Web Design and Publishing
Jake Batsell | Southern Methodist University | Technology Reporting | Digital Reporting
Katy Bartzen Culver | University of Wisconsin-Madison | In-depth Multimedia Reporting
Serena Carpenter | Arizona State University | Online Media

I wanted to share with you my Online Media students’ portfolios. The group sought to capture attention by incorporating graphics, rollovers, and pictures on their homepages. You can also browse portfolios from past semesters.

Mauro Whiteman
Gabriela Rodiles
Kayla Frost
Connor Radnovich
Aiyana Havir
Alex Gregory
Kelsey Roderique
Josselyn Berry
Kate Kunkel
Brittany E. Morris
Alex Lancial
Pearce Bley
Dani Schenone

My students completed their final projects for my Online Media class. Their projects impressed me. Many students have not had any technical skills training prior to this class.

I was also moved by my students’ desire to help people with their research and reporting on difficult topics.

I try to encourage students to create a site that reflects quality and experimentation. I ask students several questions as they design their final projects:

1. Is this information meaningful?
2. Are you helping?
3. Why is this information important?
4. Will people understand what you are trying to communicate?

I would also suggest another tip to educators. People need context. To help orient the reader, students should use summary decks, definition of terms, information history boxes, timelines, lists of facts, a resources page, etc. to help readers understand the issue. I often ask my students what do people need in order to understand this topic.

Next semester I plan to try another experiment focused on encouraging public engagement. I will let you know how it turns out. Feel free to browse my students’ sites.

ALS
Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) is a progressive neurodegenerative disease. Also known as Lou Gehrig’s disease, it attacks brain and spinal cord cells responsible for muscle movement. About 30,000 Americans have the disease at any given time, according to the ALS Association. Currently, there is no cure. ALS affects more than just nerves—it wears at patients’ families, lifestyles and emotions. From the loss of independence to the loss of a loved one, the struggles are plenty for those affected.

The Pain of Healing
Self-injury is a difficult topic to discuss. Society often fails to look past the cuts and burns to find the real source of pain. This website provides an in-depth look at different behaviors associated with self-injury, the reasoning behind these behaviors, and treatment options for those wanting to seek help. After conducting extensive research on this topic, the goal is to raise awareness and help erase the stigma associated with self-harm.

For Sale: A Home Foreclosure Educational Resource
From the Housing and Urban Development (HUD) to ASU’s Civil Justice Clinic, resources aimed at helping families overcome the effects of foreclosure have attempted to alleviate the situation. These are the stories of the impact of home foreclosure in Phoenix.

Scars of War
In 2001, the United States became embattled in the longest war in U.S. history. Since it began, more than 42,000 military members have returned home injured. These injuries can range from concussions to missing limbs. But they also include injuries that aren’t physically visible. No scars are the same. And every wounded warrior experiences them differently. This is an in-depth look at service members’ experiences and how they deal with the prolonged effects of war in the Middle East.

The Perils of Public Transit
A team of reporters sought to more precisely understand the public transit conflict. You can read stories about local bus drivers, the dangers that Phoenix bus operators face, the status of contract negotiations, and the future of passenger service.

Immigration Economics
Even before Arizona’s immigration law, known as SB 1070, Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio made it his goal to end illegal immigration in his county. His plans are to arrest and turn over illegal immigrants, who were violating other laws such as working with fake documents, to Immigration officials. So far, Arpaio’s office has arrested hundreds of suspected illegal immigrants, but little is known about what happens to those arrested. This site touches on some of those issues.

Citizens of Nowhere
The journeys of refugees from their countries of origin to the United States may last only a few days, but adjusting to their new life is a long process — one that often involves government-funded agencies and community groups. Once the refugees become citizens, they often create cultural centers and continue their traditional celebrations. This site shares some of those stories.

I strive to help my students understand how to visually communicate their work with people. One way of reaching people is through their  professional portfolio.

If your school or department does not help students present themselves professionally online, your students will struggle finding employment. To help my future students and other people, I post my Online Media 305 students’ portfolios every semester. I was asked to present on how I help students with this task at the Journalism Interactive conference. In my presentation, I shared some of the advice I give my students.

1. Clean Design
You must help people “see” your content. The “seeing” of content can be enabled through the design principle of contrast. Our eyes like contrast. To create contrast, vary up site font size and type. A trend that some site creators are following is a minimalist design with big headings. Marie Catrib, Brian Hoff, and Jacqueline Guiterrez are examples.

Color is also another way to create contrast. Your website should not always be painted with blocks of your favorite color. One tip is to use color as an accent. I am not a fan of pink, but Jessica Goldberg used it effectively by including touches of it in her headings throughout her site. Remember, site design can affect your credibility.

2. Clear Navigation
Keep your navigation simple. One of the best ways is to categorize your work rather than forcing the visitor to scroll through a maze of unrelated clips. Some good examples of navigation include Dave Hill’s photo portfolio and Julia Tylor’s use of folder icons. You could also consider creating a tab for your latest projects.

3. About Me
One way to connect with the web audience is by sharing your passion for your work and people. A bio should not lead with “I am a student studying at XYZ university. I will complete my degree in 2014.” It is important to lead with your professional foot rather than your student identity.

People connect with faces and smiles. Post a natural-looking professional photo of yourself. Do not include the high school photo of yourself with a guitar or dance club pictures. Good examples include Laura Parkinson, Molly Smith, and Etka Poudel.

4. Contact
On a contact page, you should post your full name, a professional email address, and social media identities. Social media and community building skills are attractive to employers. Social media skills reflect that you understand how to connect your content to people. I would suggest Googling for free social media icons.

5. Resume
For SEO purposes, I require my students to post a portion of their resume in text. Stephanie Paeprer created beautiful contrast on her resume by using both a serif and sans serif font. Remember, a resume should be well-designed and the job responsibility section should include powerful verbs and specifics about what you did.

In addition, it is important to clearly communicate that a PDF copy of your resume is available for download.

6. Content Motivation
If you are a journalist, self-motivation is an expectation. The ease of publishing has enabled any almost person to publish content, but most people are not motivated to publish content on a regular basis.

• Blog:  As you write, you learn more about yourself and the topic. I have posted tips on how to encourage students to publish blog posts, think of blog topics, and connect content to readers.
• Clips: Michael Pollen linked to his articles appropriately by providing a headline, publication, summary and date of each article. To make increase levels satisfaction, add a summary paragraph for each multimedia project.  You should aggregate PDF copies and links to your articles. It is important to capture PDF copies of site pages because link stability can be an issue. You capture PDF screen grabs by selecting File > Print > Save as PDF.
• Multimedia Web Series: A few ways to show your multimedia work is by creating a YouTube channel (e.g., Peter Hadfield), sharing social media releases for a company, launching your own radio program, or starting your own video web series on a issue in your community.

7. Services
Angela Grant clearly communicates her desire to get paid for her talents on her homepage. You should do the same. For example, Aaron Lavinsky created a separate tab listing his photography costs. This is an opportunity for you to earn freelance money and learn how to continue doing what you love following graduation.

8. Images
People are attracted to images. Anyone who uses Facebook can attest to the lure of images. Most people have access to a camera, and thus, there is no reason why you can’t post a photo portfolio such as this slideshow created by using Flickr.

If telling stories on the human condition is your dream job, show me humans. Photographs that display emotion and human faces can affect the visitor. Selena Larson included a photo from her volunteer efforts in Africa to show the type of work she desired. Stephen M. Katz and Poh Si Teng designed their portfolios with a similar intention.

9. Video Resume
More than 80% of U.S. internet users have watched an online video. People spend more time on a website if a video is present. One way to elevate your video resume is by making it interactive. Mashable reported on Graeme Anthony who used YouTube Video Annotations to help visitors more easily digest his video resume reel. Annotations enable you to create a video with clickable chapters.

10. Infographic
There are some simple tools to use to create a graphic that visually communicates your skill knowledge areas. Jeremy Pennycook‘s circles, Jessica Goldberg’s WordCloud, and Heather Billing’s interactive graphic are examples.

Take advantage of free services that help you present your resume in a creative way. I suggest to all my students to sign up and complete bios on free sites such as About.me (e.g., Lee Semel),  Flavors.me (e.g., Jade Rehder), and Visualize.me (e.g., Erica Swallow). Also, some sites for design inspiration include WebDesigner Depot‘s web design trends, flavors.me directory, and Leslie-Jean Thornton’s aggregated list of examples.

I tell my students that the only limitation is your mind. Give yourself or your students’ time to be creative. To help them transform a blank page into a website, tell them to list words and draw pictures that come to mind when they think about their lives and their career. Every semester I am taken aback by what they accomplish when given the time.

Students must know how to cultivate community. It is becoming more common to expect that they secure a social media following prior to graduation. As an example, the Klout score is the new the press pass. A high Klout score suggests that you have influence among your followers.

The number of people using social networking sites is growing. And more than half of U.S. adults follow a brand. Information providers must know how to write stories, but they must also learn how connect that content to readers.

The responsibility of promotion and connection is shifting from the organization to the individual. Broadcast journalists are expected to tweet and Facebook. The majority of journalists operate social media accounts. However, the posting of content does not guarantee an audience especially if you are a student.

I have found students can learn computer-mediated communication in a short amount of time. But at first, most students treat social media applications as if they were Facebook.

My students are required to tweet for two weeks after my Twitter lecture. The reoccurring theme I hear each semester is that they do not understand Twitter until I ask them Tweet information for two weeks. Following that assignment, I require my students to write a small reflection paper. These are excerpts from my honor’s section:

“Before this project, I didn’t fully understand the point of Twitter, and I mostly used as an extension of my Facebook profile.”

“I was aware of the value of Twitter, but I had yet to reap the rewards because I did not understand how to make use of all of its advantages.”

“I had a Twitter account, but it might as well have been completely inactive. My lack of interest probably spawned from not understanding the purpose of the social media site … I would never anticipated at the beginning of this project that I would 53 followers within two weeks. I will absolutely continue to use Twitter.”

“Coming into this Twitter project, I didn’t have a high opinion of Twitter and my underlying, unspoken goal was to get through this project as quickly as possible. However, after just two weeks on the aforementioned social media, I have come to understand and enjoy the rapid sharing of information.”

My students are amazing. But it is an invalid assumption to think that students are digitally savvy in all spheres. Each application cultivates a unique community, and to be respected by its members, people must know how to speak the language to engage participants. People tend to connect to people they perceive as like-minded, which positively influences trust.

As a teacher, you need to encourage them to publish useful information for a niche community. One component of credibility is expertise. They should develop expertise in a topic area to help position themselves as an information authority. This is uncomfortable for some students, but it is how intellectual communities are built.