[ATTW-L] Information on Industry Partnerships

Mon Sep 2 19:45:37 UTC 2019

Hi all...

Our department (English @UAH) leverages all four areas Lisa mentioned. Most
of these relationships are fostered through either our undergraduate TW
minor or our graduate certificate programs: Tech writing and User
Experience(UX). Here are a few details below.

1-- internship relationships: Our TW minor has an internship requirement.
We source internships through UAH but also through our industry connections
discussed below. For the TW and UX cert, the internship is an elective.
2-- advisory boards: We have a TW board to chime in on the course content,
provide access to jobs and mentoring, and facilitate ongoing discussions
about TW in industry. We will likely put together a UX advisory board soon.
3-- client-based projects: Our graduate certs both benefit from industry
and gov projects. We have a running tally of projects that local industry
is interested in, and we make regular requests to source additional
projects for courses/faculty that require/request them.
4-- research partnerships: Most of our research partnerships are through
our UX lab. In the lab, we foster graduate and undergraduate students and
attempt to put them to work directly on industry and other faculty research
projects and/or UX experiments. Some of this is new territory for us (the
lab has been open about 2 years) and some of it is ongoing. Some of our
examples of industry-academic projects are below:

    ---we started collecting data for a collaborative article about UX
creativity with a local company this month. One industry partner approached
us with the proposal. We cleared IRB recently.
   ---we run lunch & learns each semester to talk about various UX methods,
tech, approaches and how best to deploy.
   ---industry partners are invited to be participants, where warranted, in
various UX experiments.
   ---we provide student participants for company focused UX experiments;
we help our partners design experiments and clear IRB as well
   ---we have a proposal in the works for an edited collection about the
collaboration between academia and industry. editors will be from industry
and academia.
    ---the lab faculty serves as mentors for companies in the UAH
incubator. Through this new program, incubator companies will begin to
employ our students in their upcoming UX research studies.

Our active research partnerships have to do with the university's deep
connection to NASA and the Redstone (local army military base). Local
industry has numerous UAH grads. Therefore, our calls to form partnerships
have usually been answered. We cultivate these partnerships by putting on
workshops, lunch& learns, just-a-lunches, providing and going on tours of
facilities, and in general staying in contact.

I'm more than happy to answer questions more specifically.

Regards...

Joy Robinson, PhD
Asst Prof
New Media and Technical Writing, University of Alabama in Huntsville
Director of the VUElab
joy.robinson at uah.edu
twitter:@njoying
pronouns: she/her

On Thu, Aug 29, 2019 at 3:19 PM Lisa Melonçon <meloncon.research at gmail.com>
wrote:

> Across the field, industry partnerships take on 4 distinct forms.
> -- internship relationships: about 70-80% of degree programs have formal
> internship programs that they developed themselves or developed in
> conjunction in an office on campus such as an Office of community
> engagement. There is a large body of literature within the field on this
> type of partnership. I would start with: Hirst, R. (2016). Bonding With
> the Nuclear Industry: A Technical Communication Professor and His Students
> Partner With Y-12 National Security Complex. *Journal of Technical
> Writing and Communication, 46*(2), 151-171; Bourelle, T. (2014). New
> Perspectives on the Technical Communication Internship: Professionalism
> in the Workplace. *Journal of Technical Writing and Communication, 44*(2),
> 171-189.
> -- advisory boards: like Wayne pointed out, advisory boards take on a
> couple of roles, but most often they are used as partners in some way to
> provide feedback to students and to faculty and admins on the relevancy of
> the program to local industries. About 35-45% of programs have a formal
> (and some informal) advisory board. These boards vary in composition (From
> alumni of the program to others in local industry). There is a small body
> of scholarship on these and I would start with: Söderlund, L., Spartz,
> J., & Weber, R. (2017). Taken Under Advisement: Perspectives on Advisory
> Boards From Across Technical Communication. *IEEE Transactions on
> Professional Communication, 60*(1), 76-96.
> --client based projects: in some ways similar to the relationships of
> internships, these are one off or longer term relationships where a course
> works with a specific client on a project. While integrated across the
> curricula at both undergraduate and graduate level, the capstone course is
> where the most formalized of these may occur. These are often developed
> from contacts or word of mouth and are often not sustained in any real way
> beyond the course. Though, they can be if the projects come from an ongoing
> relationship from a long term internship partner or specifically from a
> member of the advisory board. See Melonçon, L., & Schreiber, J. (2018).
> Advocating for Sustainability: A Report on and Critique of the
> Undergraduate Capstone Course. *Technical Communication Quarterly, 27*(4),
> 322-33; Kramer-Simpson, E., Newmark, J., & Ford, J. D. (2015). Learning
> beyond the classroom and textbook: Client projects' role in helping
> students transition from school to work. *IEEE Transactions on
> Professional Communication, 58*(1), 106-122.
> -- research partnerships: these are pretty rare with only a handful of
> institutions that have ongoing relationships and those are typically
> associated with research labs of some sort.
>
> Related, a number of institutions have local scholarships that are
> connected to local STC chapters or other professional organizations.
> For information on the STC, you can likely contact them to get a list of
> student chapters and/or student scholarships.
>
> For those considering building these sorts of relationships, here are
> some recommendations on how to get started (if you more in depth
> information, please email me. What follows is a summary from several
> appendices in my book.)
> -- what primary programmatic or course goals do the partnerships support?
> it is not enough to say that you need industry connections. You need to be
> able to determine exactly why. Is it for a check point on the relevancy of
> current skills to local industry? Is it for a pipeline of client projects?
> do you want to give students vetted internship opportunities?
> -- has your program, department, or institution (or all three) developed
> or tried to develop these type of partnerships currently or in the past? It
> is always good to know any. local histories before you make a move into
> local communities or organizations. If they have, try to find out as many
> details as possible as to what worked or didn't and what is still around or
> not.
> -- is there an office an campus that deals with these sorts of issue? even
> at small schools--and definitely at larger ones--there is often an office
> that is charged with these sorts of relationships. their helpfulness
> or usefulness is a mixed bag, but it is generally a good move to at least
> inquire.
> -- are there local chapters of professional organizations relevant to
> industries in which your students may work? such as local STC,
> AMWA, instructional design, marketing or PR chapters, etc.
> -- think of leveraging your local networks of people you. know and who
> they may know. Send an email introduction to you and to your program with.
> very specific action items of what you may want to accomplish. Generally,
> an email that is just about meeting is not going to get the same response.
> (I have samples of these if you want them.)
> -- staffing and sustianability: you have to consider how to build these
> with your current staffing and then how to sustain them. If you do not have
> the staff or resources to sustain initiatives, you may wan to consider
> other options. Said another way, if you are the only driver
> and only advocate, then it may not be the best use of your time because it
> will suck you dry and then die on the vine should you leave or step down or
> if you priorities change. A single person or a couple of people cannot be
> expected to build a TPC program with these sorts
> of relationships because they take time and energy to nurture and sustain.
> this is why I always include staffing when considering any programmatic
> change or addition.
>
> And to be clear, I am a huge advocate of all programs having a connection
> in some way to the local industries in their areas, but my own experience
> in industry and in the years of progrmmtatic research, I do want to caution
> these are hard to build and even harder to sustain. Thus,
> thoughtful consideration beforehand is key to any large programmatic
> change, and industry relationships are a large programmatic change.
>
> Always happy to chat with those interested to work through the pros/cons
> of these sorts of things and/or to share the fuller versions of the
> information presented here.
> Lisa
>
>
>
>
>
> Lisa Melonçon, PhD
>
> Co-Editor, Rhetoric of Health and Medicine (
> http://journals.upress.ufl.edu/rhm
> <https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=http-3A__journals.upress.ufl.edu_rhm&d=DwMFaQ&c=l45AxH-kUV29SRQusp9vYR0n1GycN4_2jInuKy6zbqQ&r=pixVoNlEUATCd42x07Q5ArPXRPzmxr7XUhwZ3R0VPL8&m=Shj3vbvM5sT5RXbA2Q4DPfyv9-MYu0r9-86YpB-c3Jo&s=kHZQlabmFC-di_7ldUObKDW_e4L69mcKBtbd9nAiW_U&e=>
> )
>
> Series Editor: Foundations and Innovations in Technical and Professional
> Communication (https://wac.colostate.edu/books/tpc/)
>
> Professor, Technical & Professional Communication
>
> Department of English
>
> https://www.usf.edu/arts-sciences/departments/english/
> <https://na01.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.usf.edu%2Farts-sciences%2Fdepartments%2Fenglish%2F&data=02%7C01%7Cmeloncon%40usf.edu%7Ce75d9f5bc132485bcf3508d646846df3%7C741bf7dee2e546df8d6782607df9deaa%7C0%7C0%7C636773931959217946&sdata=YR50K7JF5CaXnwLcHdbXCvt8E%2BlXZgU0EIQLnwTOcOw%3D&reserved=0>
>
> University of South Florida
>
> 4202 Fowler Avenue, CPR 311
>
> Tampa, FL 33620-5550
>
> Phone: 803-370-0008
>
> Email: Meloncon dot research [at] gmail dot com OR meloncon [at ]usf dot
> edu
>
> http://tek-ritr.com
>
> Twitter: @lmeloncon
>
> Pronouns: she/her/they
>
>
>
>
> On Thu, Aug 29, 2019 at 2:51 PM Grover, Stephen <stephen.grover at park.edu>
> wrote:
>
>> I second Fernando’s request. I’m a brand new faculty member at Park
>> University, brought on to develop our PTW offerings, and one of my first
>> steps will be to conduct interviews and focus groups with local employers
>> in the KC area to find out how we can tailor our offerings to their needs.
>> It would greatly benefit me if any on this list were able to share their
>> own findings from such efforts, any published articles in this vein, and
>> any general advice. Feel free to message me off list or get a conversation
>> going right here.
>>
>>
>>
>> Thanks in advance!
>>
>> David
>>
>>
>> Stephen   Grover
>> Assistant Professor of English
>> Park University ‑  Parkville Campus
>> English
>> 8700 NW River Park Dr
>> Parkville ,  MO   64152
>> *stephen.grover at park.edu* <stephen.grover at park.edu>
>> This e-mail message and any attached files are confidential and are
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>>
>> *From:* ATTW-L [mailto:attw-l-bounces at attw.org] *On Behalf Of *Sanchez,
>> Fernando
>> *Sent:* Thursday, August 29, 2019 8:32 AM
>> *To:* attw-l at attw.org
>> *Subject:* [ATTW-L] Information on Industry Partnerships
>>
>>
>>
>> *CAUTION:* This email originated from outside of the organization. Do
>> not click links or open attachments unless you recognize the sender and
>> know the content is safe.
>>
>> Hello all,
>>
>>
>>
>> My department is currently debating expanding our PW presence in the
>> current English curriculum and I’d like to be able to speak to the benefits
>> that might come from cultivating industry partnerships via a strong TC/PW
>> presence.
>>
>>
>>
>> I would greatly appreciate any information on how your programs and
>> departments have benefited from industry associations — research
>> collaborations, resource allocation, funding for fellowships, scholarships,
>> research projects, etc. These aspects could be at the undergraduate or
>> graduate level and could involve either faculty or students.
>>
>>
>>
>> Please feel free to message me off list. Any information would help
>> immensely.
>>
>>
>>
>> Thank you for your time.
>>
>>
>>
>> Best,
>>
>>
>>
>> Fernando
>>
>>
>>
>> Fernando Sánchez
>>
>> Department of English
>>
>> University of St. Thomas
>>
>> Fsanchez at stthomas.edu
>>
>> [image: University of St. Thomas : All for the Common Good]
>> <https://www.stthomas.edu/e>
>>
>> [image: University of St. Thomas : All for the Common Good]
>> <https://www.stthomas.edu/e>
>>
>>
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>>
>
>
> --
> Lisa Melonçon, PhD
> Co-Editor, Rhetoric of Health and Medicine (
> http://journals.upress.ufl.edu/rhm)
> Book Series Editor, Foundations and Innovations in TPC (
> https://wac.colostate.edu/books/tpc/)
> Professor, Technical Communication, Department of English
> University of South Florida
> 4202 Fowler Avenue, CPR 311
> Tampa, FL 33620-5550
> Phone: 803-370-0008
> Email: meloncon.research at gmail.com or meloncon at usf.edu
> http://tek-ritr.com
> Twitter:@lmeloncon
> Pronouns: she/her
>
> _______________________________________________
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