Editor\u27s Page

Editor reflects on journal\u27s first six years and acknowledges the service and commitment of past editors

Lobbying as a Means For Expanding the Communication Instructional Base: A Second Look

Members of our discipline should agree that communication scholars and instructors be the principal designers of the learning goals, subsequent activities and corresponding assessment of communication instruction on college campuses. There is ongoing broad interdisciplinary support that communication instruction be an essential learning outcome of general undergraduate education

Determining Reasonable Accommodations for the Learning Impaired: New Issues for Able-Bodied Communication Administrators

This article discusses issues surrounding able-bodied communication administrators. The first issue confronting communication educators involves the nature of interactions with disabled students. Such students may be reluctant to disclose their personal circumstances to their instructors, even when a campus student counseling services office arms them with explanatory documents intended to affirm their sincerity and disarm the potential for them to feel embarrassed. Some learning impaired students have been isolated, misunderstood, and stigmatized, thus, the simplest act of communicating may become fraught with anxiety. The second issue confronting communication educators involves how sensitive we are to the broad nature of what constitutes a disability that warrants a reasonable accommodation

SCANS and the Goals 2,000: Educate America Act -- External Validation for Expanding Communication Instruction Requirements Across the Undergraduate Core Curriculum

This article discusses the role of the Goals 2,000: Educate America Act in expanding communication instruction requirement across the undergraduate core curriculum. The act provides funds to underwrite states development and implementation of content and performance standards and associated assessment methodologies directed towards helping students meet nationally determined academic and occupational skill standards. The National Council on Education Standards and Testing recommended the development of education standards that will provide direction for voluntary compliance by the states. The speech communication field has been actively involved in developing a national assessment agenda and corresponding communication skills assessment instruments and methodologies

Instructional Resource Innovations for the Introductory Communication Course

The following four articles represent the proceedings of an SCA Seminar held at the New Orleans convention: Instructional Resource Innovations for the Introductory Communication Course. These monographs detail four multi-media resource areas that introductory communication course directors can consider: Storytelling — the student-as-medium (Pamela Cooper); Visualization — the student-as-medium (Joe Ayres and Debbie M. Ayres); Self-confrontation — applications involving the use of videotape with public speaking instruction (Craig Newburger, Linda Brannon, and Arlie Daniel); and Computer-Mediated-Communication (Gerald M. Santoro and Gerald M. Phillips)

Hostile Work Environment: What Communication Administrators and Educators can Learn from Communication-based Law

This article examines the university sexual harassment policies which guides communication administrators in reacting to and managing both student and faculty sexual harassment-based allegations. The body of sexual harassment-based law, created and disseminated by persons who are not communication administrators or educators, focuses directly on specific human communication behaviors and assigns criteria for evaluating the relative lawfulness of the behaviors. The article intends to underscore the variety of heuristic possibilities offered by inquiry into communication-based laws, for both communication administrators and educators

Administrator Beware: External Supervision Issues Regarding Human-Subjects Based Research

This article discusses external supervision issues regarding human-subjects based research in education in the U.S. Ongoing changes in federal, state, and campus regulatory environments regarding human subjects based research compel speech communication administrators to take a more active role in ensuring that area faculty and graduate students are aware of current regulations and guidelines governing their related research activities. Speech communication matters and doctoral students involved with human subjects-based research normally are focused on sorting out basic experimental design and data collection. Awareness of emerging regulatory issues concerning how their human subjects-based research is conducted may not be adequately addressed in graduate level design classes