Student Column: Another Successful Annual Conference
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2012 Graduate Student Reception |
First Amendment Forum at ASU |
Nastasia visits the Grand Canyon with daughters. |
At this year's conference of the International Communication Association, I got the chance to meet with many student members, some of whom were attending for the first time and some of whom had attended before. Many of them had suggestions for future sessions and ideas for future projects. All of them had words of praise for how the ICA conference is organized and how it caters to the needs of student members.
On Friday, 25 May, at the impressive Sheraton Downtown Hotel, student members of ICA had the opportunity to attend the New Member and Graduate Student Orientation session, in which Larry Gross and Cynthia Stohl, the past president and the current president of ICA, gave details about the activities of the organization and the key events at the conference. Additionally, I presented some information about the Student Affairs Committee and student opportunities at ICA, and John Paul Gutierrez, ICA's new Communication Director, discussed ways to interact with ICA through traditional means as well as through social media.
That evening, at the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism of Arizona State University, over 200 people attended the annual ICA Graduate Student Reception. The host university offered its First Amendment Forum, in which we were able to experience state of the art journalistic equipment next to an exhibition showcasing the history of journalism. ASU also generously provided an assortment of local foods and refreshments for the reception. Student participants enjoyed the atmosphere, the conversations they were able to have with peers as well as representatives of the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism, and the lively music selected by a local DJ.
On Saturday, 26 May, and Sunday, 27 May, student members of ICA were able to discuss in small groups and in a personal manner with top scholars in our field, as part of the ICA Master Classes. These talks featured: Mark Knapp, Jack McLeod, James Curran, Stanley Deetz, Chin Chuan Lee, and Dafna Lemish. Through the Master Classes, students had the opportunity to learn directly from scholars whose writings they had read prior. I attended one of these discussions and I was very pleased with the intense exchange of ideas and the energy between the established and the emerging scholars.
Many of the ICA student members I talked to at the conference also said that they enjoyed the chance to take tours of Phoenix and the surrounding areas. I was one of those attendees of the conference who took a day off from the academic conversations and visited the Grand Canyon. Being able to admire, together with my daughters (Daria, 10, and Alexia, 8), the wild scenery, was one of the highlights of the time I spent in Arizona in May 2012.