Life in Academe
Events and experiences that remind me that I’m a professor and I love working in higher education.
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Rethinking the Classroom
The collaboration surrounding the James L. Knight School of Communication and the 2012 Democratic National Convention has been highlighted on the national level. Dr. John A. McArthur, an associate professor in the Knight School of Communication, had an article published in the Journal of the Association for Communication Administration in its recent issue. The article,…
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A Letter to those embarking on a Master’s Capstone
Dear Master’s Candidates, You’re about to embark on a year-long inquiry that will test your mastery of communication. It will be challenging, arduous, frightening, and highly rewarding. You can expect to read volumes of research and to spend hours upon hours thinking and writing and discussing your work. You will probably have dreams about your…
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Return to Radio
The article below was featured on the Queens University of Charlotte website on June 20, 2013: Return to Radio The fantasy of many 20-somethings, and all marketers, is to create a video that goes viral on YouTube. Pick a subject – cats, exploding milk cartons, a bad hair day. If it gets thousands of views,…
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30 Questions for a More Localized Media Release
Making any story a local story is one of the great challenges of both journalism and public relations work. This semester in my Integrated Strategic Communication course, students were working on media releases and feature stories. Seitel’s The Practice of Public Relations notes that most media releases either struggle to be well-written, localized, or newsworthy (and…
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Tiny Radio in Class: Podcasting Returns to Campus
The article below was featured in Campus Technology Magazine and online on May 15, 2013. Tiny Radio in Class: Podcasting Returns to Campus By Dian Schaffhauser When 99% Invisible blew through its fundraising goal on Kickstarter by four times, the “tiny radio show about design” brought renewed attention to the lost art of audio podcasting. It also piqued the…
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Which Social Media Fits You?
“We wanted to create an interactive and fun way to connect people to their social media – and show how it can cause some introspective reflection,” remarked Taylor Nelson, one of the designers of the project. “It was a short, simple, and sweet way to interact with people on campus. And the quiz took less…
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Royals Radio, Season One
This semester, students at Queens University of Charlotte embarked on an exploratory learning experience in episodic, podcast-based radio. The resulting “Royals Radio” is a product of Queens University of Charlotte, and Dr. John A. McArthur and was produced by students and faculty in an interdisciplinary studies class at the university. Each episode has a different producer and topic,…
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Recapping AAC&U’s 2013 General Education Conference
“What colleges have been doing isn’t wrong or irresponsible. But, it is insufficient.” These opening sentiments from Dr. Terrel Rhodes, AAC&U’s Vice President set the stage for considering the change facing higher education at the 2013 conference on general education. The meeting’s setting along Boston’s Freedom Trail was a telling metaphor for for a conference…
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Royals Radio – Episode 01
PUBLIC ART, COMMUNITY, & QUEENS DIANA “Public Art, Community, & Queens Diana” investigates the history and life of Young Diana, Goddess of the Hunt – a bronze statue in the center of the Queens University of Charlotte campus. The statue, cast by Anna Hyatt Huntington, arrived at the university in 1940 and has served as…
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Codebreaking, Secrecy and Other Classroom Problems
Puzzled? My students are. At least in name. This semester at Queens University of Charlotte, I have the pleasure of designing and facilitating an “exploration seminar” in the art of puzzling. The “Puzzled” course gives students the opportunity to learn and think about a variety of problem solving strategies, not the least of which is…
J.A.McArthur 