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Extracted from CRTNET issues 6565, 6570, 6573, 6576.
Date: Fri 2/22/2002 12:18 PM From: Cameron Basquiat cameron_basquiat@ccsn.nevada.edu
Query: What can you really do with a communication degree?
Last week I heard a disturbing story from a colleague at my institution.
Apparently she had a few students who went to the student academic counseling center with the intention of declaring a communication major but were told not to do so. Reasons were given including the lack of jobs for Communication majors. Said counselor also posed the question, "what can you really do with a communication degree?" When I heard this I was furious and wanted to get on the phone and scream at head of the Counseling department and his entire staff. But after a few days to calm down I had another idea. While I am still very upset with the counselor who gave these students this misinformation, I do think that there is a potential solution to help lessen this problem.
I think the counseling folks just don't know how many jobs a communication grad can hope to get, nor do they seem to grasp the communication and business literature which lists multiple communication skills as their most desired traits and abilities in new hires. As such, our department is deciding to develop a 1-2 page sheet listing the benefits of being a Communication major and the opportunities that such a degree can lead to. We could give this to all counselors for their review and also to be passed out to students. (And maybe even have a workshop session with the counseling department (or like 10 minutes at their next meeting).
I was wondering if anyone on this list serve has run into similar issues and what you have done about it. Your insights and experiences will be appreciated.
Thanks in advance,
Cameron Basquiat
Dept. of Communication
Community College of Southern Nevada
cameron_basquiat@ccsn.nevada.edu
Assistant Editor's note: The National Communication Association has recently designed an update of their poster, careers that are available to those receiving a communication degree. The poster can be ordered through the publication center at 301-362-6912. The price is $17.50 which includes a shipping and handling fee.
NCA provides resources
The National Communication Association (NCA) provides several resources to help colleagues like Cameron Basquiat respond to the question:
"What can you really do with a communication degree?"
Hope this helps.
Sherwyn P. Morreale, Ph.D.
Associate Director
National Communication Association
1765 N Street, NW
Washington, DC 20036
smorreale@natcom.org
202-464-4NCA (622)
FAX 202-464-4600
Sherwyn P. Morreale, Ph.D.
Associate Director
National Communication Association
1765 N Street, NW
Washington, DC 20036
smorreale@natcom.org
202-464-4NCA (622)
FAX 202-464-4600
Date: Fri 2/22/2002 4:47 PM From: Ann Rosenthal rosenthal_ann@colstate.edu
Revise our messages
In Response To: What can you really do with a communication degree?
I am struck by our first reaction to this question being that many jobs demand "communication skills." Perhaps we should consider the failure of such rhetoric to persuade and revise our messages. Of course, not just many but all jobs require communication skills. They do not require a communication degree. If we continue to consider communication "skills" as our central value then we deny ourselves the uniqueness offered by our special knowledge.
I don't teach skills; I teach concepts, which students learn to apply, resulting in far more than a skill set. It is not management knowledge but conceptual knowledge of communication that has become the driving force behind commerce-creating corporate structure and culture. The Chief Information Officer in software firms is first and foremost a communication professional with an understanding of how communication "is" commerce. The conduct of international relations is not about political science; it is about the ability to engage in information warfare, negotiation, and diplomacy-all of which are grounded in communication conceptual knowledge-not skills, but 4,000 years' worth of study of strategic communication.
The NCA poster is nice, but it, too, may contribute to the lack of value placed by too many on our body of knowledge. Some of my colleagues interpret it with comments such as "jack of all trades and master of none" messaging or indecision as to what we really are. I know who I am because of my education, and I have been on more than one occasion the only candidate considered for a particular position because of my specialized communication education. If we are tired of being misunderstood, maybe we should consider just what it is that we are communicating about ourselves. Respectfully,
Ann Rosenthal, Ph.D. Communication Information Technology Management Columbus State University Columbus, GA 31907 rosenthal_ann@colstate.edu
Date: Fri 2/22/2002 3:21 PM From: Thomas G. Endres TGENDRES@stthomas.edu
Wall of cards poster
Follow-up: What can you do with a communication degree?
In response to Cameron Basquiat's experience with a Counseling Center that did not understand what students could do with a COMM degree, allow me to share what our department is trying.
We sent letters to our COMM major alum from the past 5 years or so, and asked them to send us their current business card. When the cards arrived, we made them into an 18" x 24" poster. The design was essentially to create a "wall of cards" look (43 cards in all), with a sign in the middle that reads "What can YOU do with a Communication major?" Additional text provides dept. info, URL, etc., and the explanation that these were actual business cards from actual COMM majors from our school. Not surprisingly, the variety of jobs represented on the cards made the point we wanted it to; that there are many things you can do with a communication major. We made the posters on the zoomer at Kinko's for less than $4.00 apiece.
As department chair, I hand delivered copies to be put up in our Admissions, Academic Counseling, Career Counseling, and Continuing Studies (eve./weekend) offices. The rest are posted in res. halls, student center, etc. We also shrunk it down to an 11" x 17" size (cards are small, but still legible) for handing out. So far, the reaction has been very positive.
Thomas G. Endres, Ph.D. Chair, Professor Communication Department University of St. Thomas LOR303, 2115 Summit Avenue St. Paul, MN 55105-1096
tgendres@stthomas.edu (651) 962-5823 (off) (651) 962-6410 (fax) http://personal4.stthomas.edu/tgendres/Professional/page1.htm
Date: Sat 2/23/2002 2:27 AM From: Bill Loges logesw@earthlink.net
Encouraging students to become college career counselors
I've never worked at a college or university where the central career development or advising office had the first clue what to say to communication majors. As Cameron Basquiat describes in CRTnet #6565, students in our departments, and potential students, can be greeted with profoundly ignorant remarks from the staffs of such offices. Most departments in my experience just arrange their own career advisers within the department and discourage students from bothering with the central office.
I've often wondered whether that inefficient solution was the most desirable, and I applaud Cameron's efforts to educate his school's counselors about the many opportunities for our majors. I'm not optimistic, but not because I know anything about CCSN (Cameron's institution). I hope it works, and that he shares the methods he uses with CRTnet. A solution to this would be very welcome.
In the mean time, maybe we should start aggressively encouraging our students to become college career counselors. If we keep at it for ten years or so, pretty soon we'll own that vocation! Heh heh heh, another victory for communication! (Loges twirls his moustaches menacingly . ..)
Bill Loges Lecturer and Research Associate Annenberg School for Communication University of Southern California loges@usc.edu
Date: Fri 2/22/2002 5:35 PM From: John Bowers bowersj@bendnet.com
Communication and your career
When I directed an undergraduate communication program at the University of Iowa and personally advised about a hundred students a year, I began the practice of sending in the spring a postcard addressed to me to each of my advisees who had graduated the previous year. My accompanying letter asked each recipient to use the postcard by reporting to me what the graduate was currently doing. As I recall, about two-thirds usually responded. If the poster currently being distributed by NCA is based on the earlier Scott-Foresman poster and tee-shirt, the list displayed originated in my students' responses on those postcards. Nancy Harper and I used the list in an appendix we once contributed to an edition of Gronbeck, Ehninger, and Monroe, Principles of Speech. The appendix was entitled "Communication and Your Career," or something like that.
John Bowers 408 NW 12th St. Bend, OR 97701-3046 541-312-5148
Note from Sherry Morreale, Associate Director of the National Communication Association:
Dear colleagues: First, thanks to John Bowers for serving as our "disciplinary memory" and sharing the history of the NCA poster, "What Can You Do With a Communication Degree?" I for one was unaware of this history and so appreciate knowing about it. The poster just re-designed by the NCA National Office is based on the earlier Scott-Foresman poster and tee-shirt, that apparently had its roots in the work of John Bowers and Nancy Harper who produced the original list "Communication and Your Career." In that regard, producing a tee-shirt as well as a poster may well be an idea whose time has come. Very clever.
Best regards to all,
Sherry M. Sherwyn P. Morreale, Ph.D. Associate Director National Communication Association 1765 N Street, NW Washington, DC 20036 smorreale@natcom.org 202-464-4NCA (622) FAX 202-464-4600
Date: Mon 2/25/2002 6:00 PM From: Charles H. Tardy charles.tardy@usm.edu
Poster replicated with other disciplines
The poster referred to in several recent posts has been replicated with other disciplines. I've seen one identical to the communication poster that reads "What can you do with a degree in English?" Graphics and job descriptions were the same. Someone told me that they produce the same poster for all the liberal arts programs, e.g. "What can you do with a degree in History?" "What can you do with a degree in Sociology?" We stopped displaying ours as a consequence.
Charles H. Tardy
What people do with an education in communication studies
Perhaps this is too fine a point to put on the matter, and if John Bowers beat me to this, I'll gladly let him keep the medal for it. In 1975 the Speech Communication Association published, in James H. ?McBath and David T. Burhans, Jr., Communication Education for Careers, my small report, "What People Do with an Education in Communication Studies," based on a talk given in Los Angeles ca 1974. As an assistant professor at UC Santa Barbara, and having been an undergraduate myself in a department with a small number of majors, and most of those whom I knew moving toward careers in academia or some position requiring further professional education, I was concerned what our then-burgeoning group of majors might do with their education after they graduated. The method I used to answer the question was quite simple (and, no doubt, inadequate):
I read through the most recent SCA Directory and wrote down a hundred or so occupational titles and put those into a list. Thus, a list of "what people do with an education in communication studies."
Gerry Philipsen, Professor and Chair of Speech Communication Department of Speech Communication University of Washington, Mail Stop 353415, Seattle, Washington 98195-1271 USA Telephone (206) 543-4860 (Speech Communication) Fax (206) 685-1841 email: gphil@u.washington.edu
Careers that I have never thought about
I am currently teaching our Introduction to Communication course. There are so many areas to cover that when designing the syllabus I wanted to combine areas. The students come to the class having completed Public Speaking but I felt it needed to be reviewed. I also believe that interviewing is an important topic to cover. I developed an assignment where the students interview a professional who currently has a job that they would like to have after graduating with a communication degree.
Prior to the interview they research the career, write a description of the organization, and prepare the questions (labeling the types). The students then present a speech based on the interview. This is the second semester that I have had this assignment and it has been extremely successful. Ideally the students are sophomores when they take the course so it is a perfect time for them to begin thinking about their careers. Students have discussed careers that I have never thought about after teaching communication for 30 years. An added benefit is that two students both semesters were offered internships at the organization where they interviewed.
Linda Loomis Steck Area Coordinator, Communication Arts Indiana University South Bend 1700 Mishawaka South Bend, IN 46632 219-237-4162 lsteck@iusb.edu
Date: Tue 2/26/2002 10:26 AM From: Vincent Hazleton vhazleto@runet.edu
Important facets of a communication education
I appreciate Ann Rosenthal's observations about the importance of conceptual and theoretical knowledge of communication. While such information is critically important to management the success of organizations, entry level positions usually focus upon the technical skills of message production. We try to prepare people for careers not just their first job. However, even at the management level, knowledge of communication is only half of what a manager must know in order to be successful. All of the communication knowledge in the world is not useful if you do not have something to say that others are interested in hearing.
Professional communicators must also possess specific knowledge about their employers, the industry in which they work, and their audiences. Most of this is not taught in communication departments. This is why minors, second majors, internships, and a broadly based liberal arts education are important facets of a communication education. Can you imagine a Chief Information Officer in a software firm that doesn't have significant knowledge and understanding about software design, limitations, competitors, and their own products?
Date: Tue 2/26/2002 7:33 PM From: John Bowers bowersj@bendnet.com
The "poster" and "tee-shirt"
If Sherry Morreale is going to use me as her institutional memory, I'd better be accurate. The NCA poster listing jobs a communication degree can lead to, if it comes from the earlier Scott, Foresman poster, was, as I said, copied from postcards I solicited from my former students about a year after they graduated. The list, then, comprises entry-level jobs actually reported by communication students.
The appendix I mentioned that influenced Scott, Foresman to compile the list is Nancy L. Harper and John Waite Bowers, "Communication and Your Career," appendix I to Douglas Ehninger, Bruce E. Gronbeck, and Alan H. Monroe, with Linda Moore, Principles of Speech Communication (9th Brief Edition) (Glenview, IL: Scott, Foresman, 1984), pp. 333-347. I was wrong in my earlier message when I said that the list of jobs is in the appendix. I now remember that Scott, Foresman edited them out in order to use them on the poster and tee-shirt.
I have two versions of the tee-shirt that more-or-less duplicated the poster. One, an earlier version, says under the list of jobs, "Scott, Foresman and Company." Another, a later and slightly more elaborate version, says at the bottom "To learn more about careers in communication, see Principles of Speech Communication, Ninth Brief Edition, Ehninger, Gronbeck, Monroe, with Moore, Harper, and Bowers (Scott, Foresman and Company, c 1984). I know that the more elaborate one is a later version because I remember that Harper and I complained to a Scott, Foresman representative that we should be credited for the list on the tee-shirt.
John Bowers 408 NW 12th St. Bend, OR 97701-3046 541-312-5148
Date: Tue 2/26/2002 10:52 PM From: Bruce Gronbeck bruce-gronbeck@uiowa.edu
Our majors get decent first jobs
For those who want the deep background on the "What can you do with a communication degree?" poster: Yes, John Bowers and Nancy Harper did the appendix for an edition of Monroe and Ehninger (then Ehninger and . . .then Gronbeck and . . . then ?McKerrow or German and . . .). Scott, Foresman and Company then published the book, and we decided to turn the appendix into a convention giveaway. We did a survey of twenty university departments of speech/communication, ultimately generating some 640 job titles. They were arranged on the original poster. So nearly as I can remember, we probably gave away more copies of the poster than we sold of the book (well, that's not true . . .). My poster was regularly ripped off my office door; good thing I had a a big supply. It was later reprinted on cheaper paper, etc., so it lost some of its appeal as a poster, but it remained popular. And yes, Chuck, other editors wanted in on the action for their disciplines, so the poster concept circulated.
But, in answer to Cameron's question: I don't know about your university, but at mine, among the jobs gained by graduates with various majors and using our Liberal Arts and Business Administration Placement Center, year after year Communication Studies majors are going out for the highest salaries of any majors except Business Administration majors. And we're graduating about ten percent of the majors in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences. Period. Tell the counselor to get real..... Given where so many of the post-collegiate jobs are-sales and entry-level jobs in businesses and service organizations-it's easy to understand why our majors get decent first jobs.
Go get 'em, Cameron.-Bruce Gronbeck
Date: Tue 2/26/2002 9:02 PM From: Cameron Basquiat cameron_basquiat@ccsn.nevada.edu
Follow up
What you can do with a communication degree?--Follow up
I wanted to write an update from my original post. Since last Thursday when my post first appeared I have received many helpful emails from so many CRTnet members in addition to those posted back on this web site. This problem my program is facing is certainly not a unique one. Many people have written me sharing stories of what they did when faced with a similar situation and yet others indicate they too face this dilemma and are looking to see how my program deals with it.
First, I want to say a collective thank you all who have emailed me perosnally and to those who have posted on the CRTnet. What a wonderful group full of so many members eager to help their colleagues. THANK YOU.
Second, the emails I received presented some solutions, asked new questions, and offered comments that furthered how I thought about this issue. As such I would like to share those comments with the CRTnet group. I am rather busy this week preparing for the WSCA conference in Long Beach, CA this weekend but next week I will make an effort to edit the emails and put them together in one readable email (with authors names removed for their own privacy) and post it on the CRTnet. Look for that email in early March.
Sincerely,
Cameron Basquiat Dept. of Communication Community College of Southern Nevada cameron_basquiat@ccsn.nevada.edu
Date: Tue 2/26/2002 5:37 PM From: Dale Cyphert Dale.Cyphert@uni.edu
Most careers require technical or theoretical preparation
I'm not sure that realizing communication majors, history majors and English majors are in competition for the same jobs is any reason to throw out the career planning efforts.
It's important to recognize that communication, like any other liberal arts undergraduate degree, is NOT a specialization, but a grounding. We might want to carefully differentiate our programs at the masters level, and certainly at the Ph.D. stage, but for the undergraduate looking for "a job" the questions (and answers) are quite different.
I'm becoming curious, in fact, as this conversation continues, about the answers. Just what jobs ARE there? The posters (whatever their derivation) have always seemed to illustrate that a communication degree means very little in terms of specialization. Like many undergraduates, I took a minor (public relations) to prepare myself for a "real" job, and I'd bet that most of the "communication careers" on the posters are still a reflection of specializations in sports, leisure, business, art or some other area ABOUT WHICH the individual is prepared to communicate effectively.
Short of a career in "corporate communications" or some similar business-communication field, who can come up with a career that does NOT involve some sort of "other" area of preparation to go along with it? and, thus be perfectly suitable, as well, for a history r English major?
Certainly we are not claiming that other liberal arts majors don't HAVE good communication skills simply because they do not study them on a theoretical level. Conversely, I think we need to be careful that we don't sell our majors on the basis of having the skills to perform any and all careers that require "good communication skills." Most careers do require some specialized technical or theoretical preparation as well.
Dale Cyphert, Ph.D. Business Communication Program Coordinator College of Business Administration University of Northern Iowa 1227 W. 27th Street Cedar Falls, IA 50614-0125 (319) 273-6150 dale.cyphert@uni.edu
Date: Wed 2/27/2002 11:48 AM From: Carol Jablonski cjablons@chuma1.cas.usf.edu
Determine what skills you want to develop
This question has come up a great deal lately. Although I did not see it myself, a student told me that there was a report on CNN that stated that the worst major for students looking for jobs today is Communication. Another student in that class posted a question to a discussion Forum on our Blackboard site: "what kind of job can one realistically expect to get with a Communication degree?" After explaining that most college graduates do not get jobs in precisely the area of their majors, I replied with the following message: (which I realize is customized to our campus and dept, but hopefully will be of some use to others.)
"....a degree in Communication gives you opportunities in a variety of fields that require or value analytical, critical and creative thinking skills; the ability to conduct research (library, survey, interviews, etc.); a facility in writing, speechmaking, group facilitation, and interviewing; capacity for leadership, collaborative (team) as well as independent work; and ability to learn new ways of thinking and working (which is really what makes it possible for one to advance in work life.) Trust me when I say that this list is something many employers would affirm as containing important skills-stuff they are looking for in new employees. Also I believe that Communication uniquely prepares its graduates to excel in all the above.
Looking at that list, some of the fields our students go into would naturally include: law, public relations, survey research, graduate study in Comm or a related field (to become teacher-scholars at the community college or university level), association work (i.e.non-profit sector), grant writing, community development, organizational development, ministry, social work, media-including journalism, editing, proofreading, etc. Our undergrad advisor has an even longer list of career alternatives that you can look at.
I also want to emphasize the need for every major to determine what kinds of skills you want to develop and to choose courses appropriate to those skills. If you want to go into law, take rhetorical theory, rhetorical analysis, advanced public speaking, and argumentation and debate. If you want to learn how to do research and develop your writing skills, take rhetorical analysis and/or some of the courses we offer in qualitative research; if you want to improve your performance skills, be sure to take upper level courses in public speaking and performance. If you want to be a community activist or organizational innovator, take rhetoric and social change, or organizational change. In other words, look at the courses you want to take-not just the courses that are offered at a convenient time! There are a lot of courses we offer that are good for ANY prospective job-like interviewing, organizational communication, communication and diversity, and communication and gender. So try to avail yourself of these as well.
Finally as I said in class do take every advantage of what USF offers.
There are free services at the Marshall Center that will allow you to learn how to use computers for scanning images and creating ?WebPages...There are also courses in computer programs that you can take for free or a nominal amount at the computer center .... Learn how to use online research tools. If you are having problems with writing, go to the Writing Center on campus with assignments you have for class, and they will help you develop your writing skills (you'll improve your grades plus develop a very important skill on the market). If you haven't already, learn how to set up a web page! You never know when that skill may help you. Employers know what people learn in college courses; you will impress prospective employers if you can demonstrate that you learned MORE than they expect of you by immersing yourself in the opportunities provided you by virtue of your being at a major university.
All of these skills are very valuable in the professional marketplace and will help you "get in the door". Expect to have to learn a lot on your new job(s) because most companies will also train you to the specific job functions they associate with their positions.
I hope this helps!"
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