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Members of the STEM workforce are notorious for lacking the ability to describe their work to people outside of their narrow fields. This primarily results from a lack of training in oral communication that focuses on how to communicate with the public. Graduate students do not receive extensive opportunities to practice the communication skills crucial for effective professionals. Most communication experience in graduate school comes in the form of presenting at technical conferences or presenting their work to their peers. The resulting inability to communicate effectively, and communicate to a wider audience, contributes to the void in scientific engagement of our citizens. As a long term consequence, our broader society does not understand the importance of STEM and in turn, does not strongly support nor champion STEM-related policies. To meet the grand challenges that face our population, we need a STEM workforce with exceptional communication skills, as well as a society that understands and supports large scale initiatives to spur STEM innovation and bolster STEM education. This paper presents a novel oral communication curriculum that is being developed and tested at Montana State University. The program, called the "STEM Storytellers Program", uses a transformative approach to training graduate students that pulls knowledge from the journalism and performing arts community. Our program has three specific components: (1) creating jargon-less podcasts; (2) receiving training from an improvisational actor on stage presence; and (3) presenting at "curiosity cafes" to audiences from the general public. This project is funded through the National Science Foundation Research Traineeship (NRT) Program within the Innovations in Graduate Education (IGE) track. This paper will present the design of the curriculum including the overarching theoretical framework, programmatic issues, and recruiting. This paper will be of interest to faculty that wish to improve graduate student oral communication skills and are seeking novel programs that are being pilot tested at other universities.

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Board 81: STEM Storytellers: Improving the Oral Communication Skills of STEM Graduate Students American Society for Engineering Education

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Members of the STEM workforce are notorious for lacking the ability to describe their work to people outside of their narrow fields. This primarily results from a lack of training in oral communication that focuses on how to communicate with the public. Graduate students do not receive extensive opportunities to practice the communication skills crucial for effective professionals.

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Communication is an essential part of any society. From building connections with peers to influencing decisions and motivating others, the ability to express ourselves in public is a crucial skill. However, for many students (as well as adults), speaking in front of a crowd is a terrifying experience. According to the National Social Anxiety Center, about 73% of the population experiences public speaking anxiety, or glossophobia.

One of the best ways to overcome this fear is through practice. Read below for three activities educators can use to develop their students’ public speaking skills!

Group Brainstorming

Often, the most powerful and effective solution is the product of many different ideas. During a group brainstorming session, students take turns expressing their ideas to their team. However, in order to share their opinions, they must first have the confidence to speak up. In this format, students have control over how long they want to speak in public. Over time, this activity can help children gain confidence in expressing themselves and work toward speaking for longer periods of time in front of others.

Presentations

Researchers who work in STEM fields often give public presentations to share their findings with both their colleagues and the public at large. To replicate this practice in a classroom environment, educators can instruct their students to give presentations to share and explain what they’ve learned. While addressing their peers, children can practice their public speaking abilities. In order to give each student a chance to improve their skills, make sure the members of each group are given the opportunity to speak during their allotted time.

Pitching Inventions

Once inventors have protected their inventions with a patent, it’s often the case that they need to raise money in order to help produce and market their creation. Popularized on a national level by ABC’s hit show Shark Tank, “pitching” is the act of selling a group of potential investors on the viability of an idea or business. Effective STEM programs teach students how to create, protect, market and pitch their creations. When executing a pitch activity, students should have a limited amount of time to present what they’ve created and must identify the most important and appealing aspects of their creation. By speaking under these conditions, children will gain the valuable practice of expressing themselves under pressure — a skill they can use well into adulthood.

Learn About Our Education Programs

The National Inventors Hall of Fame® prides itself on providing holistic STEM education programs that place an emphasis on teaching students how to express and apply what they’ve learned. For more information, we encourage you to visit our website.

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Communication is an essential part of any society. From building connections with peers to influencing decisions and motivating others, the ability to express ourselves in public is a crucial skill. Learn how STEM can improve public speaking skills from t

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Prior to my enrollment as an engineering student at UC Berkeley, I had spent most of my high school extracurricular life involved in community activities. Since I was 10, I found the courage to communicate with others in Student Government to make change in my school. At 14, I needed to speak up to patients at a local hospital I volunteered at, and to my boss at the tutoring center where I worked. Each activity I devoted time to required effective communication, a trait that wasn't taught in high school, yet necessary to effect change in the real world.

Luckily, I was good at it, so volunteering or working wasn't as much of a challenge as it could have been. Yet I can imagine the difficulties I would face if I hadn't gained those skills as a child.

I didn't notice this gap between what was being taught in school and the skills needed for successful communication, a key to portraying your best self in the real world, at the time. I then graduated high school, was accepted to Berkeley and started my four year journey as a STEM major. Suddenly, I could no longer do everything I did in high school that subtly pushed me to practice my communication skills. Lectures were large and based on one way communication. The discussion sections that followed were short enough that presentation opportunities were infrequent. I noticed I was pushing myself to read, write, and engage in conversations more, creating these experiences because college wasn't meeting this need.

In a time where each job posting has hundreds of applicants and success as a job seeker is heavily based on how you present yourself, effective communication can make a huge difference in your career trajectory. Therefore, teaching engineering, or any science, without many opportunities for communication or leadership classes doesn't make sense.

STEM curriculum needs to include more courses in communication. Leadership is a trait that allows certain people to rise in the workforce. Without it, there's a ceiling to one's influence and ultimately one's earning potential. In the company I'm interning at this summer, the highest paid and most influential individuals have correspondingly high leadership roles.

In fact, research from Southwest Texas State University suggests that "communication competence is a prerequisite for effective leadership" (Walking the Talk: The Relationship Between Leadership and Communication Competence). STSU conducted a study of 151 employees in 9 organizations, surveying communication competence of supervisors and the effectiveness of their leadership, and found a strong correlation between effective communication and effective leadership.

In the College of Engineering at UC Berkeley, in addition to engineering classes, there is an American Cultures requirement, Reading and Composition requirement, and humanities requirement.

American Cultures gives us insight into our nation's history. Reading and Composition teaches us how to analyze events and present our thoughts succinctly, but only ever on sheets of paper.

UC Berkeley, which has been mobilizing change for the state of California since its inception, has engineering degrees saturated with required STEM classes, but no leadership ones. Physics is mandatory, yet Professional Communication is optional.

I see the value in leadership skills in addition to technical ones. To truly prepare engineering leaders of tomorrow, classes that heavily incorporate communication skills or teach presentation skills should be plentiful and encouraged.

We need to be able to fully prepare students to succeed after graduation. Communication within STEM is more important now than ever and I believe we need more courses that encourage that.

#StudentVoices

References:

Walking the Talk: The Relationship Between Leadership and Communication; Competence Journal of Leadership & Organizational Studies Winter/Spring 1999 pg. 86-97

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The Need for More Communication Classes in STEM

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Prior to my enrollment as an engineering student at UC Berkeley, I had spent most of my high school extracurricular life involved in community activities. Since I was 10, I found the courage to communicate with others in Student Government to make change in my school.

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As technology use rises, it is important that information technology professionals excel in their communication skills. In today's world communication has become easier and more important than ever. With the assistance of technology to lower the geographical barrier we can now communicate with anyone across the world, people of different cultures, religions, and professions. It is also important to clearly define the different types of communication, what the focus of each type is, and how they are related to each other in their use.

What is technical communication? It may be beneficial to examine other areas of communication. The primary type of communication used in an academic setting is academic communication. This type of communication relies on structure and formality to convey ideas (What is Academic Communication, 2019). For example, the 3-Point thesis is a structure for academic writing that provides a clear and concise argument of a topic. Professional communication takes place within the workplace. Many types of communication are present in the business environment and are relied upon during the business process (Professional Communication, n.d.). An example of professional communication would be an email. Email is a very common electronic communication method in the business field. Ray Tomlinson is commonly credited for creating email on the ARPANET system in 1971 (Ray Tomlinson, n.d.). Technical communication is a type of communication that focuses on aiding people to complete a task or goal (Parker, 2019). Don't be confused as I first was and think that technical communication is all about technology. It isn't, technical communication includes a variety of communication from manuals and instructions for operating equipment, to web pages, social media, and technical documentation for software (Parker, 2019).

With technology reaching more and more people each day and lowering the bar to communication with this population, it is important that technology professionals utilize effective technical communication skills. Our lives are increasingly busier and demanding, application developers are constantly vying for our time with new applications, and our workplace may be asking more and more responsibility of us. Proper communication can help reduce costly mistakes, and "help people get the main idea quickly. Technical communication is a field that makes our life easier and more productive (Parker, 2019)." No one likes the thought of bringing home a nice new piece of equipment or technology only to find out that it takes an extended period of time and possibly an advanced knowledge of product before it is able to be put to use. This process is frustrating, instead consider the opposite where documentation is clear, and instructions are logical and intuitive.

In summary we have reviewed several types of communication and how they are related. Technical communication is focus on the person with the goal of enabling them to complete their task. Technical communication can manifest in a variety of ways including product manuals, training programs, computer help files, and documentation (Parker, 2019). With 4.57 billion people accessing the internet (Global digital population as of April 2020, n.d.) technical communication is a vital for increasing productivity, and an important skill for information technology professionals.

Global digital population as of April 2020. (n.d.). Retrieved from statusta.com: https://www.statista.com/statistics/617136/digital-population-worldwide/

Parker, K. (2019, July 12). What is Technical Communication. Retrieved from medium.com: https://medium.com/technical-writing-is-easy/what-is-technical-communication-421bf8a2206b

Professional Communication. (n.d.). Retrieved from wikipedia.org: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Professional_communication

Ray Tomlinson. (n.d.). Retrieved from wikipedia.org: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ray_Tomlinson

What is Academic Communication. (2019, August 28). Retrieved from askanacademic.com: https://askanacademic.com/languages/what-is-academic-communication-1278/

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The Importance of Communication in STEM Fields | Blake Arnold

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As technology use rises, it is important that information technology professionals excel in their communication skills. In today’s world communication has become easier and more important than ever. With the assistance of technology to lower the geographical barrier we can now communicate with anyon…

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There are many skills that you should take away from Graduate School. For those of you in STEM fields (science, engineering, technology and math), learning to communicate your science to different audiences is critical. You may not believe that now, but consider the poor state of the public's science understanding.

There was a time when those of us in the science disciplines could be certain that all we had to do to win public opinion was to share the facts of our scientific knowledge. The public valued knowledge that came from our universities, and scientists were generally trusted.

But today, many voices compete in the marketplace of public opinion. Anyone with a laptop, a video camera and a compelling message can share their views on scientific matters that may or may not be rooted in science or even in truth. In fact, today science doesn't always have the upper hand in matters of critical importance to our country and our world - consider range of views on the issues of climate change and genetically modified foods.

At the Graduate School, and across NC State University, we value and support science communication. For the past two years, the Graduate School has sponsored the 3 Minute Thesis competition, where Ph.D. students share their research in just three minutes, with one PowerPoint slide. The challenge for the competitors is to describe their research problem, the essence of their research and anticipated results in three minutes. And their slides must help to communicate their work and their goals.

In June, the Graduate School hosted a day-long workshop where 20 students explored different ways to communicate their science. We discussed the importance of understanding your audience, for example, the difference between a general public audience or an audience of your scientific peers.

A general audience - one that doesn't have all the scientific knowledge that you do - will need very different information from peers in your research field. You need to understand how to communicate your science to an intelligent lay audience - it's not as easy as it sounds.

We also sponsor Triangle ComSciCon, a science communication effort that originated at Harvard University, now a regional workshop for graduate students in the Research Triangle Park. We also sponsor awards for graduate student and postdoctoral scholars in NC State's research image contest, offered for the first time last summer.

As researchers, we often start explaining from the perspective of our own understanding, and sometimes the vast knowledge we have acquired in our field can be an obstacle to clearly communicating our research. It is challenging for many of us in scientific fields to dial it back to the thousand-foot view that we need to communicate with that general audience.

Scientific jargon can get in the way of communicating science. All fields have their own unique jargon, and when we communicate with our peers, they understand the jargon. But outside our sphere of knowledge, the jargon only confuses people - it excludes others from our circle of understanding. Look carefully at the jargon you use, and find terms that explain the principles you want to share. If you were explaining your work to a non-scientist relative, what would you say?

Think about why you got interested in your research area in the first place - maybe you wanted to save the environment or provide a safe source of drinking water for people around the world. How did you get from that "Big Idea" to the lab or the field in which you work now? What inspired you, and what does your research offer to address the world's problems? Think about the "so what?" of what you do.

People love stories, and often they will remember a story about your research better than the theories, data and results. Think of a "hook" to catch their attention and reel them in.

You may have heard the expression, "people don't care how much you know, until they know how much you care." Share your passion for your work, and help your audience understand what it means to them - what challenges are you trying to address? How might your work improve lives?

Of course, there are many ways to communicate your science. A colorful microscopy image can look like a piece of art, but the story behind the image can capture the imagination of your audience, something we discovered through our Research Image Contest last summer.

Social media offer opportunities to share a nugget of scientific wisdom - from blogs, to Facebook posts to Instagram photos. Each media platform offers unique ways to share your science and connect to others in your field.

Whatever your passion, think of ways that you can share it with others. And make it a goal of your graduate education to become a skilled science communicator. The Graduate School offers workshops to help you hone your skills. We look forward to seeing you there.
- Dean Maureen Grasso

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Dean's Scene: The Importance of Communicating Science

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There are many skills that you should take away from Graduate School. For those of you in STEM fields (science, engineering, technology and math), learning to communicate your science to different audiences is critical. You may not believe that now, but consider the poor state of the public's science understanding.

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Anonymous English 102 Writer

February 2021

The skill of communication is severely undervalued when it comes to the subjects of STEM. STEM is a group of subjects that include science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. These subjects tend to advance society and shape the future for civilians. Communication is not considered tremendously important when it comes to STEM because of all the other skills that STEM students must learn and acquire. In most STEM fields, their jobs are primarily focused on the ability to fix issues and problem solve. Proper communication is an extremely important skill that, if not taken seriously, can prevent the advancements of STEM related research and technological advancements from being shared correctly to the public.

In "Communication in STEM Education: A Non-Intrusive Method for Assessment & K20 Educator Feedback" Mike Borowczak attempts to tackle the misconception that STEM majors and STEM related jobs do not need the use of soft skill sets (Borowczak 1). The major soft skill that Borowczak is attempting to target is the skill of communication. Borowczak explains that the benefits of effective communication are extremely important, and this skill is a pivotal ability of any successful STEM worker (Borowczak 1). As someone that is pursuing computer science and plans to continue with a software engineering graduate degree, I can agree with this stance from the author. In my previous education, not much stress was placed on the ability to present information in front of a group of people. At times there were required presentations, however not many of them were in STEM related courses. Now that I have attended two different universities, I can assure that very rarely is there communication and presentations incorporated into my computer programming courses. Collaboration is a major part of any job that involves any of these four subjects. With this being said, collaboration, quite literally, stems from effective communication and correctly perceiving relationships with fellow members of the team (Borowczak, 2). Borowczak later explains that the paring of STEM courses and laboratories have been become more popularized in order to increase the amount of collaboration and communication in these courses (2). In my personal experience, many computer programming classes that involve project-based assignments are joined with laboratories. Certain days during the week would be considered lecture days where students would take notes and listen to the concepts be explained by the professor. Typically, one day during the week is assigned as a lab day where students work together in order to complete an assignment that is centered around the concepts that were taught that week. With all this being said, stating that communication is an undervalued area for students that study STEM related fields. However, finding a method that to improve the communication skills in these students is the difficult part. In the next paragraph, I dissect another article that focuses on the same problem although it proposes a program to tackle the issue.

In the article "STEM Storytellers: Improving the Oral Communication Skills of STEM Graduate Students" the authors stress the importance that the skill of communication has on STEM fields (Willoughby). The authors later go on to explain that society is advancing at an incredible rate and STEM continues to make improvements. In doing this, STEM will keep making society easier for civilians, if not make it progress even further. In order to do this, scientist must be able to communicate their products and findings in a clear and precise manner (Willoughby, 2). The authors also emphasize that institutions and universities pay minimal focus on the importance of oral communication. With this being said, the overall premise of this article is to "develop a fellowship program for Ph.D. students that will provide[d] multifaceted training and practice in oral communication to prepare them to effectively convey science to people" (Willoughby, 3). As a computer science student, I completely agree with what the authors are indicating and demonstrating in this essay. I have witnessed firsthand, and even personally, that it is not always easy to communicate your solution to others, let alone the instructor of the course. This program will require students to record themselves presenting an idea or product that is under one of the STEM subjects previously stated. Then, the words that are used in the presentation will be broken down into three groups, counted, and evaluated by an equation to identify the amount of jargon in their speech (Willoughby, 3). By breaking down the amount of jargon that is present, students in their fields can recognize the difficulty it is for the audience to understand their presentation. Not everyone can conceptualize an idea when they do not comprehend most of the words that are being said to them. Similar to this article, I examine the research of another author tackling the problem that is, the lack of communication education in STEM related fields and majors.

In "How to Improve Communication Skills in STEM Students", Danielle Prier confronts the world of science with the issue that communication is lacking in STEM. She labels this as a "cognitive gap", an inability to communicate or explain a topic to someone that is not on the same level of education on the topic as the speaker (Prier 17). Prier first analyzes some teaching methods proposed by some professors in Singapore. Professors in Singapore developed two methods to conduct the experiment with, the first being the IRE method. This method "represents initiation of the question, the student's response, and the teacher's evaluation of the student's response" (Prier 17). IRE method was found to discourage volunteering and communication of students. This was due to the critical evaluation after a student incorrectly answered the question. Furthermore, IRE did not encourage critical and creative thinking (Prier 17). The next method is known as the social constructivism method. On the other hand, this method encouraged more analytical and critical responses to the questions being asked. Prier continues by saying that this method increased the number of student-to-student responses and collaborations (Prier 17-18). This is an important element when it comes to engineering. Not only being able to explain your research and findings but being able to communicate critically with team members to accomplish a common goal is tremendously important. Many times, engineers are working in teams and are each assigned a problem to solve. If you are able to solve the problem but cannot effectively communicate how you came to the result, then you are a liability to the team.

In "What is Literacy?" written by James Gee, Gee explains the importance of communication and the different types of communication that exists. He further explains this as discourse, the way that communication is accepted in different groups and settings. He draws the comparison of discourses and "identity kits" (Gee 18). Gee further explains that when thinking of discourse, "think of a discourse as an "identity kit" which comes complete with the appropriate costume and instructions on how to act and talk" (Gee 18). Gee's article relates to all three of the articles chosen because of this idea of discourses and identity kits in STEM. When communicating with your team, often times, you are working in a team that is in the same level of education as you. However, if you must present your findings or project to a business or an audience, all of them might not understand the jargon that is correlated to the field of work. This can cause for misunderstandings or even rejection because the audience does not know what the presentation was about. This directly relates to Gee's definition of literacy; he describes this as the "control of secondary uses of language" (Gee 23). As an engineer or scientist in your respected field, you will have to talk to a lot of different people. Whether these be your authorities, acquaintances, customers, or even audiences. A lot of times you may not talk to all of them the same and use the same diction. The ability to switch between your critical thinking and solutions that you present to your boss and the questions and concerns that you have when solving a problem that you tell your acquaintances or partners can be drastically different conversations. This relates to all of the articles that I have chosen because they all deal with preparing STEM students for these types of situations. Effective communication, across any field or profession, is a mandatory skill to possess.

Each individual article that I chose either stressed the importance that communication and/or provided a plan to help students improve the ability to effectively communicate their information. When taking STEM courses, many times professors focus on more conceptual and problem-solving skills and exercises. While this is not a horrible idea, some attention needs to be drawn to other soft skills like communication and presentation. Without this, the findings and advancements that are discovered can suffer. If you can not effectively and clearly explain your results, then you can not expect for your audience to get behind your findings or solutions. Proper communication is an extremely important skill that, if not taken seriously, can prevent the advancements of STEM related research and technological advancements from being shared correctly to the public.

Works Cited

Borowczak, Mike. "Communication in STEM education: A non-intrusive method for assessment & K20 educator feedback."  Problems of Education in the 21st Century  65 (2015): 18.

Gee, James Paul. "What is literacy."  Negotiating academic literacies: Teaching and learning across languages and cultures  (1998): 51-59.

Prier, Danielle. "How to Improve Communication Skills in STEM Students."  Communication and Technology in the Classroom: 17.

Willoughby, Shannon D., et al. Board 81: Stem STORYTELLERS: Improving the Oral Communication Skills of STEM Graduate Students. 2 July 2018, peer.asee.org/board-81-stem-storytellers-improving-the-oral-communication-skills-of-stem-graduate-students.

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3.8 Communication and writing in STEM (synthesis)

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Anonymous English 102 Writer The skill of communication is severely undervalued when it comes to the subjects of STEM. STEM is a group of subjects that include science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. These subjects tend to advance society and shape the future for civilians.