Michael Grosch, Charlotte Kaempf, Gerd Gidion:
Teaching Media and Communication Competencies to Science and Engineering Students
The urgency for teaching science and engineering students’ competencies such as public communication, media use, or grant writing is reflected in recent issues of major journals [Nature 445: 124, 2007; Science 315: 161, 2007 (editorial, Jan 12)]. Candidates who will bring on the table more than research skills will be successful in finding employment in competitive positions. This raises the question how training of such key competencies can be introduced into existing curricula at technical universities.
Our experience shows that study program directors are open to support respective changes in curricula. We will discuss changes in the syllabus of a (technical) communication course designed for graduate students from developing countries, and show its transition from optional subject (since 1998) to mandatory subject (from 2008); this exploration, focusing on verbal text production, is funded on survey data defining the need for such training. On the other hand, for science and engineering students training in media use for presentation of data is as important as writing texts. With respect to such media competency we are in the process of designing relevant course units; this exploration will be funded among others on a content analysis for the use of technical visuals in annual reports by PhD students (DFG Research Training Group “Natural Disasters“ GRK 450). We will discuss relevant pedagogical issues for both areas – handling words and creating images.