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Recent Accomplishments/News

Important Advising Announcements for Winter 2009

For advising information for Winter 2009, please click here to download an information sheet (the file is in .pdf).

Dr. Jennifer Simpson, SPCOM Undergraduate Advisor, will not have office or advising hours the week of January 19-23. Please email if you have urgent questions or concerns.

Dr. Simpson's Office Hours for Winter 2009 are: Wednesdays, 10:30-12:00 and Fridays, 12:30-2:00. Her office is in ML 254D.

SPCOM has developed a series of checklists to assist you as you make your way through your program. You can download the checklists at the Undergraduate Advising/Curriculum page (click here or on the left).




Thinking of graduate school? Consider an undergraduate thesis.

Open to Honours Speech Communication students, SPCOM 499 A/B is a full-year course which entails researching, writing and presenting/performing an undergraduate thesis in an agreed-upon faculty-supervised area of Speech Communication. If you are interested in pursuing this option, click here to download guidelines in .pdf format.




CLSI Faculty Member, Dr. Robert Ballard, gives public presentation

Communication, Leadership and Social Innovation

presents

What does(n’t) it mean to be adopted?

Dr. Robert Ballard, Assistant Professor, Communication, Leadership and Social Innovation, University of Waterloo & Ms. Sarah Ballard, M.A., Colorado Licensed Professional Counselor

Grounded in the Ballards’ personal narratives, this presentation explores some of the misunderstandings and challenges faced by adoptees and their families. The Ballards offer practical experience, scholarly research, and concrete advice for adoptive families and adoption policy. There will be a Q & A session following their presentation.

This event is free and open to the public!

Saturday, January 31st
10:00 am to 12:00 pm
RCH (J.R. Coutts Engineering Lecture Hall) 301
University of Waterloo campus

Metered parking available south of South Campus Hall for $3. Visit http://www.uwaterloo.ca/map/index.php for a campus map and parking details.

Special thanks to Marcy Lemon-Lawrence, Adoption Practitioner

In addition to serving as an assistant professor, Dr. Ballard is a Vietnamese adoptee. He is also an adoption writer, researcher (specializing in adoptee identity and adoptive families communication with three forthcoming publications), international speaker and workshop presenter, and consultant. He has co-founded two adoptee-led organizations, is the advisor of a forthcoming documentary film on Operation Babylift, and a prospective adoptive parent to a son from Vietnam.

Prior to re-locating to Waterloo, Ms. Ballard had a successful counseling practice specializing in international and transracial adoption. She is the author of Xpress Yourself!, a play therapy based curriculum for international and transracial adoptee groups. She has led a variety of adoption workshops and is a sought after adoption speaker and trainer. She has four adopted siblings from Korea and is a prospective adoptive parent to a son from Vietnam.

The Speech Communication program is now housed within the Communication, Leadership and Social Innovation Unit with new offices and a fresh new look!

 

There are some exciting collaborations emerging in the Speech Communication program. Speech Communication has joined with the Social Innovation Generation (SIG@Waterloo) Initiative and the Centre for Cultural Management to form "Communication, Leadership and Social Innovation" (CLSI). CLSI is a dynamic unit dedicated to stimulating and enhancing learning, change, and communication identiļ¬ed as necessary across diverse sectors and cultures in society. Through unique initiatives which connect academics and broader communities, this unit actively participates in local, national and international partnerships for practical research and the development of meaningful education (undergraduate, graduate and community-based)  on leadership and change-related concepts, designs, practices and impacts.

CLSI is located in ML 235. Please stop by and visit anytime! You can also find out more by linking on the links to CLSI on the left.


 

Dr. Amber Zimmerman has a new article out!

Dr. Amber Lynn Zimmerman has a new article recently published in the Iowa Journal of Communication (Vol. 40, No. 1, Fall 2008), entitled Autoethnography as Vessel: Energy as Communicative Praxis. The article explores the relationship between energy, writing, and scholarly research. Congratulations, Dr. Zimmerman!