JOCELYN WILLIAMS EDUCATOR

I’ve actively developed ways of working with Performing and Screen Arts (PASA) colleagues to benefit student learning in certificate and undergraduate Communication courses because of the valuable PASA screen programme and facilities, which offer the opportunity for students to develop the required industry-standard media production skills. It makes sense for Communication to work closely with PASA because of (very) shared interests in media production as well as Event Management.

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I’m motivated to explore ways of showing colleagues that nothing is impossible – that interdisciplinary collaboration can be part of the everyday way we do things. A project I led in 2014 – 2015, producing a TV series The Living Community with student involvement, is a perfect example.

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The project was a combination of communication research (Williams, 2016, 2017), student learning (Williams et al., 2014) involving students and colleagues from several disciplines (Communication, PASA, Social Practice, Design, and Business) and relationship building with community stakeholders. Working with a team of Unitec researchers across those listed disciplines that had established community research projects, I successfully brought The Living Community documentary series to fruition.

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Objectives of the project included:

 

• Student learning - through taking part in a hands-on media production project, in team-based real project work;

• Community media research (Williams, 2015, 2016; Williams et al., 2014; Williams & Saifoloi, 2016);

• Community voice and empowerment – through media content creation so their story is told (Clark, 2015; Clarke, 2015a, 2015b; CUE Haven, 2015a);

• Unitec community researchers deepening their engagement with communities where they’ve been doing their research;

• Alignment with Unitec’s strategic outcomes – interdisciplinary collaboration (Unitec Institute of Technology, 2015); “Meeting the needs of the community”;

• Trailblazing what can be achieved in integrating learning and assessment into real world projects: exploring and demonstrating the value of complex collaboration (Unitec Institute of Technology, 2015).

 

The result was a six part news magazine style series shown on Sky TV in April - May 2015.

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In leading and driving these ongoing research and student learning relationships I’m giving expression to Unitec’s longer-term commitment to (a) serving the community, (b) giving back to its catchment area, (c) developing rich and meaningful contexts for students doing real world projects, based on a two-way (Unitec-community) relationship, and (d) delivering on “research with impact”.

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You can see the results in the final edited CUE Haven documentary on YouTube.