Students Design and Showcase ePortfolios

The Noel Studio and students in the CMS 495, Communication, Leadership, and Change, course taught by Dr. Jennifer Fairchild collaborated on the annual ePortfolio Bootcamp. This collaboration provides students with an intensive series of workshops designed to enhance students’ thinking, processes, and practices that contribute to effective ePortfolio development. Students in the CMS 495 class participated in eight workshops facilitated by Noel Studio staff members, including the Executive Director, Dr. Russell Carpenter, and graduate consultant, Melissa Gerritsen.

Initial workshops helped students learn the strategies behind creating an effective ePortfolio, including honing design decisions, developing digital artifacts, crafting oral communication elements, and learning strategies for web-based written communication that enhance their projects. Workshops began with analysis and moved students through a low-tech design-thinking process as they considered a wide range of options available to them as communicators. Students then began creating their own ePortfolios by making decisions about visual elements, videos, and organizational strategies.

The ePortfolio Bootcamp culminated with an ePortfolio showcase held in the Noel Studio Greenhouse. Students delivered brief presentations to explain their decisions and how their ePortfolios portray them as emerging experts and leaders in the communication field. Students also received feedback on their final ePortfolios that will prepare them for their chosen profession.

Drs. Fairchild and Carpenter won the top panel award in the Communication Center division at the 2015 National Communication Association (NCA) Convention held in Las Vegas, NV, for research conducted through this collaboration. They will use this research to enhance future collaborations along with ways in which communication design is taught through ePortfolios at EKU and nationally.

Published on December 05, 2015