"Get that quote," and "Uncas"

#clarkclass 12.0 gets the quote 

Ryan Dunn takes a risk, with humor

This week concluded the 12th time I've taught Twitter for Media in the Mass Comm department at the University of central Oklahoma. It may be ":Uncas."
It started with me buying Twitter for Dummies," but following advice from media pros. It became my favorite class, opening my eyes and heart, and my students,' to far more than just a social media platform.
Hashtagged #clarkclass, students still stay in touch, and learn so much from the many professional speakers I bring in from many different fields, banking, PR, broadcast, sports, advertising, HR and digital marketing, plus more.
You can get a rundown on what they learn by checking the class blog, #ClarkClassUCO, https://clarkclassuco.blogspot.com
As a journalist, I often interrupt speakers, yelling at students to "Get that quote," and it's become sort of a motto for students.
You can read my comments on that, on that class blog. Students also learn that I value quirky stuff, people who take risks, have humor, and are not cookie cutters.
This time, the last student presentation, on the last class day, student Ryan Dunn made his presentation on his "social media adoptee," and took a risk, with humor, to bring us all to laughter.

Sporty storyteller, Skype, Holograms next?

Mike Sherman's twitter page

@okieprof
Ask Mike Sherman a question about twitter and @MikeSherman answers by telling stories, stories about people and sports.
Mike, a graduate of our UCO journalism program in the 1980s is now sports editor of the Tampa Bay Times, after holding the same position at our student newspaper, The Vista, and The Oklahoman.
He's an earlier adopter of twitter and considers it essential to covering sports, or anything else for that matter, for a newspaper.

Class member Ryan Dunn's pix and tweet and question.
I bet it won't be 10 years.

He's also an earlier adopter of the twitter for media class when it was first offered in December, 2014...12 versions ago.
Technology met technology as we "Skyped" him in for the second time. He in his newsroom, while watching people in flip flops and shorts outside in Florida, while we shivered with freezing temperatures outside.
The stories he tells are punctuated with specific dates and people of games that long ago, so as a journalist he's a model of how to use twitter professionally.
After the session, we debriefed, and her are some student comments, including a few from four years ago, dutifully recorded by @MadisonSturgill.

• He’s hired people he found on twitter, checking their work
• A storyteller, one for every point
• Talked about “Mr. Unreliable”
• Worked for The Oklahoman for almost 30 years
• He’s not going to hire someone without a twitter presence
• Twitter isn’t the only place to use but it’s a heck of a start
• Can’t live without twitter
• All news is “breaking” these days
• Views himself as a friend of the readers
• Our classes have changed the curriculum at UCO
• Even though everyone wants to get paid it’s a compliment when someone is interested in your work
• Goes to different writers to increase his traffic
• How you conduct yourself on twitter shows how you are as a person
• Try not to use absolutes on twitter
• He uses twitter as a phonebook (found a vet for his old yellow lab)
• Finding out what’s important. That’s how you use twitter
• Watches the game while using twitter at work
• Cautioned us about the negative side of twitter and to be careful
• Be an early adopter. It opens up new ideas
• Twitter can be “all bad and a bag of chips” but it can also be good
•  You have to distribute your own content
• You're your own paperboy
• Liked the “What’s the Headline” and the use of reader involvement
• Staying connected and getting connected is important
• Conversation is the most important technological medium
• Twitter is one of the greatest listening devices of all time and one of the greatest search engines
• After "Mr. Unreliable," he went on twitter and asked the public what ideas were for headlines, admitting they were wrong to lighten the mood about the situation
• The paper is a way of answering questions for the people that can’t ask them themselves

Living lessons in staying up to date in rapid change

From twitter for media class, #clarkclass, at UCO Mass Comm Dept.

Ok, funny photo of #clarkclass, suggested by Dr. Desiree Hill. Humor helps you stay up to date

by @okieprof
How to you stay up to date?
It takes work, curiosity, and associating with those colleagues who set the example.
In rapidly changing times, one of the easiest pitfalls for professionals who become professors is to be stuck in the past, or not adapt to the present and future, even though we urge our students to be able to adapt, to always learn. Do do that negates our valuable experience.
That's one of the joys for me in teaching the twitter for media class, in bringing in colleagues and professionals who are living sermons in living change, from many different fields.

"...this class isn't about twitter, it's about the future and life."

And for me, an old newspaper guy, one person who sets that example for our students is our broadcast professor Dr. Desiree Hill @dezhill.
It's apparent to me from these guests, and my students, that the class is not about twitter...its about the future and life. 
Dr. Hill's quote sums it up for me, "Twitter isn't what it will be."

Dr. Hill brings a wealth of information to our students, with research, with effective teaching methods, with questions, with hands on passion to involve our students in journalism, and life.

So here are student comments from our debriefing, after she left, dutifully recorded by my student@MadisonSturgill.

• Social Media is like a relationship (dating, learning, breakup?)
• For journalists, tweet about everything at least 20 times a day
• Follow opinion leaders, they will often follow you back
• Figure out what that specific social media platform needs from you
• Always protect your credibility
• Hashtags on twitter – see what others are talking about
• Journalists are always in the spotlight when it comes to social media
• Humor is subjective
• The rules of good writing apply to Twitter
• Don’t write anything you wouldn’t say in public
• Journalism is like trying to catch a greased pig
• You are representing yourself and your employer at all times when using social media
• Twitter opens a chance for people to get to know each other
• What is our generation going to look like in 20 years?
• Twitter isn’t what it will be
• You can still be a college student and use proper grammar
• Twitter is a place where you can be a reporter, even if you aren’t one yet
• YouTube keeps going and growing

And, yes, there is a serious side to the class.

What did I do this week? Inspiration

@ScottWilliams with my twitter for media students at UCO-MassComm department

See my blog post for my twitter for media class (click here: #clarkclass ) for the story and comments on our first speaker, the dynamic, inspirational Scott Williams.
Retired? Yes, but too much fun to pass up another chance, #clarkclass 12.0 now at the Mass Comm Department at the University of Central Oklahoma.

An opinionated journal of years of changes at UCO-Part 2

The W. Roger Webb Forensic Science Institute at entrance to campus

Harold Holden sculpture of Broncho

"building a student-conscious campus"

(An unsanctioned look back at UCO--personal opinion)

Everyone has pet peeves and pet projects, I believe. That is certainly true  of the journalists I've known. Certainly of my professor colleagues. And over the years I've realized it is true as well of university administrators, no matter the level.
There's no judgment in that, because pet peeves and pet projects are neither bad nor good on their face.
What I came to value in my years at the University of Central Oklahoma were colleagues and superiors who could be detached enough to view their personal opinions and interests in a fair manner...working to make sure that they could work for the overall benefit of students and the university as a whole.

Entrance to campus

 And I dreaded those who were so self-centered that they could not be fair, would put personal projects and beliefs before the common good. That destructive behavior can harm or destroy  every level of the university, from staff operations, to classrooms,  departments, colleges and the university as a whole. Such unethical existence is the very opposite of the standards of professionalism educated, or any others for that matter, people should exhibit.
Even more dreaded were those micro-managers who would take disagreement or differences personally, and hold grudges and seek vengeance against those who didn't kowtow to all their wishes.
I've known both kinds, and realize every profession have those opposites. We've been fortunate over the years at UCO to have more of the positive people than the negative.
Looking back at the changes at UCO,  in this top-down administrative world of Oklahoma, that is certainly true of the four people who have been president.
I began this journal series, documenting the visual, physical plant changes at UCO which were not here when I started. It's been a continuing process of building, for the most part,  a more student-conscious campus.
George Nigh's pet projects in his five years here served the university as a whole, taking it from a stuck-in-the-status quo world as a commuter college. I may poke fun at all the fake Greek columns and hodge-podge architecture around campus that is part of his heritage, but for the vast majority of his  projects immensely benefited the university.
When Roger Webb took over as president in 2007, serving until 2011, the university was starting to explode in  enrollment, but it lacked needed improvements you couldn't see--infrastructure.
When I arrived, we had one computer in the department. There were no computer labs on campus. Through the early years I cobbled together, missing funds, an early Mac lab. President Webb came to a campus with few if any computer labs on campus, and there was almost no coordination for fees to pay for coordinating and updating them. His hiring and focus on that need changed the way the university operated, and looks.

Nigh's addition that joined two department buildings

In addition, I'm forever grateful that he pushed, and then Provost Don Betz authorized, the merger of the Journalism Department and Oral Communication department that housed broadcast. Nigh's addition joined the building, but not the people inside. I'd been working on that needed change for almost five years, and it took a couple more before it happened. 
We were fighting against academic turf and tradition, plus years of ill will between the two and unequal distribution of resources to students, but it made no sense to have two separate departments, given the changes in communication. That was my pet peeve and project. We still have a neglected building--student study areas, computer labs, faculty bathrooms, etc.--but at least we're merged, and still working on it.
Thus was born today's Mass Communication Department. It wouldn't have happened if it had not been for Roger Webb and Don Betz.
Webb had his pet projects as well--from his background in law enforcement, and academic turf claims were overrode by presidential fiat (another word I've always wanted to use)--thus the School of Criminal Justice came to be, splitting from Sociology, and the building of the Forensic Science Building, now named after Webb.
When I first came, I was told we'd soon build a classroom building because we needed more space. We still need more space.  Twenty years later, the Transformative Learning Center was built, though not every department has access to its classrooms. "Transformative learning" is one of the principles now enshrined in UCO's mantra, knowing there's more to learning than lectures. Those of us somewhat old sarcastic types claim we've been doing this for years, and jibe at it as the "learning learning" center, since all learning is "transformative." But it's great to have a new building, with great technology and more space. It is really cool.
Other improvements included  a wellness center,  new student housing, and additions to the football stadium, a continuing pet project of administrators, but not of most faculty, nor most students who never attend games. There are many other atheltic facility improvements for other sports.
But sculptures and landscaping improved on campus with increasingly uniform signage.
So here are more photos of the physical changes taking place during Roger Webb's tenure. 

The really cool Transformative Learning Center...

Wellness center

 The Commons--new student housing north of the library, south of Wellness Center

New student housing

Ditto

Wantland Stadium has been spiffed up, with help of fees assessed every UCO student

And private support, including a great community bank

 The athletic program makes a concerted effort to attract crowds, but we're not OU or OSU.

Plunkett Park is a field where the Industrial Arts Building was when I started.

Breathe was one of first new sculptures on campus

Outside Wellness Center, UCO is an Olympic training center

Don't know when this Broncho was erected

This corner was dedicated before I came, but landscaping has been improved.

Took years to get the student darkroom out of the unsafe basement, but we named it after our colleague, the photo program founder, Woody Gaddis, one of just five journalism faculty when I arrived.

(Next,  changes under current President Don Betz) 
Click here to read Part 1

An opinionated journal and photos of UCO changes- part I

Paved parking lots...an unappreciated symbol of vast changes at UCO

"...it looks and acts and breathes like a university."

This week marks the first spring semester in more than three decades that I've not prepared for new university classes, and the first in 28 at the University of Central Oklahoma. While I have no regrets or sadness about that, this week has reminded me of the passing of time, and the changes over the years. This will be the first of two or three posts about the changes I witnessed, beginning with the earliest. 
Caveat: (I've always wanted to use that word) This is not a UCO-sanctioned official blog, history or comments. I'm retired, and the opinions and perspective are all my own. I am thankful for and proud of UCO, especially my students and colleagues, and the progress that has been made. So these comments should be taken as good- natured, but with the understanding that some of them are tinged with a journalist's humor and faculty member's viewpoint, punctuated with a few barbs. Most of the photos have no students in them, but that's when I walked around--early one morning in late May, or in December break.
Before retirement from the UCO last spring, I took a walk around campus, thinking about the passing years and the changes.
I started taking photos of all the buildings that were not there when I arrived in 1990. I couldn't take photos of the now absent gravel parking lots, or the demolished Industrial Arts Building, the old president's house, or the East dorm.
Lots of physical plant changes have happened  under the three most recent presidents. Before then, the newest buildings were 1960s era, there were gravel parking lots, no uniformity in signage, no landscaping, no maintenance budget for aging buildings. The only changes were when faculty died, or the college changed its name again. It was sometimes, justifiable called, Broncho High. 
Not now--the academic quality of faculty, programs, students  and leadership is the highest it's ever been, and instead of a commuter school, it looks and acts and breathes like a university.
Perhaps the most changes were the result of former Oklahoma Governor George Nigh, who took over when Bill Lillard retired. Through Nigh's  political connections and bond issues, the campus began a transformation that continues today. Lots of academics didn't like Nigh being president but he was exactly what UCO needed to wake up from its long lethargic status quo. If you haven't been on campus in a few years, you won't recognize it. 
Understand the ruling principle of all higher education. 
"Turf"--At UCO   and elsewhere--space is limited, dollars are scarce, faculty positions  almost sacred, and you have to have student enrollment to justify anything. Campus politics to hold onto and increase turf--obtain space, get faculty, hold onto enrollment--has lead to cutthroat competition between departments in the past. As a new chair, I had to fight and wheedle for years for equitable resources for our students and faculty. Improvement in administration over the years has  ameliorated (another word I've always wanted to use) that quite a bit--there is much more cooperation now than when I started. But as state support shrinks as the GOP legislature deliberately works to castrate education  (What else would you call cutting UCO's state support 27 percent in the past three years?), the scramble for dollars and enrollment is still about turf--especially between different universities.
Perspective: which means that faculty and staff are indeed thankful for any new space that comes along.
Here are those improvements from the Nigh era. Most obvious to the public is the conference center and additions to the student center.
You come in off second street on Garland Godfrey Blvd, and this greets you:

East view, the joining of the old and the new

On the north side is the idyllic Broncho Lake, and the center, where landscaping is most obvious

I have neglected to get photos of the business building additon, which provided an auditorium and elevators to the second story. I'll post that next. I remember when Nigh was explaining his grand plan in an upstairs classroom, we had to carry our student newspaper Vista reporter Roy Howe confined to a wheelchair, up stairs so he could cover it. Roy has died since then. The memory hasn't.
The education building was the first completely new building on campus in years, housing the original departments from the school's teacher college days. It looks pretty good from here, but the hodge podge of haphazard architecture with fake Greek columns and more may make it the ugliest building in Oklahoma. But inside, it looks better, and has wonderful people and students there, who are thankful for new facilities after years of neglect.

Chambers Library had space almost doubled, but the real change was inside. When I first came to UCO, we got a few dollars each year to buy books for the department. They went into dusty shelves. The addition, in spite of more fake Greek columns,  helped fuel a transformation to digital technology, modern data bases and much more. The glass atrium joins the new and old.

The science building was another addition, to existing Howell Hall, and provided lots of needed space, but the money spent on fake Greek columns and unfinished labs irritated faculty for years.  Notice also the up-to date signage--a product of the last few years that has made a huge difference on campus.

A rear view from the university center.

The art building had the addition of the Melton Art Gallery.
Sidewalks--To me, the most exciting time of the year is when students crowd the sidewalks during the beginning of the fall semester. There's energy and excitement and so much more. 

Don't take them for granted. They bind the campus together, cover utility lines, and didn't exist 25 years ago.

This building goes unnoticed, but provides cooling to many buildings, through those under-sidewalk arteries.

Something that hasn't improved since those early years, is obviously the fading chipped sign on Edmond's water tower.

Two of the most neglected buildings on campus have been the music building and the communications building.

Communications received a token connection between two buildings. We also got an unappreciated Land Run mural on the side, which draws derision and controversy. But I don't want to end this negatively.

  
This plaque was also not there when I started, honoring my friend Terry L. May, who was an assistant vice president in Academic Affairs when I started. He was the one person in administration I learned I could completely trust. You could stand on his word, and even if you didn't agree, it never affected professional action and decisions. This plaque is outside the ROTC department which he, a Vietnam vet,  helped organize. I walked by this every morning for years heading for our building from the parking lot.

Snap a salute to Lt. Col. May, an officer and gentleman.

(Next, More changes you can see, and can't see)

December Departures - Old North

"Old North at UCO," 5 by 7 watercolor card

Graduation days are departures as well as beginnings, and this marks the first December in more than two decades that I won't be attending at UCO,  congratulating favorite students receiving their degrees. It's why we teach.
Retirement has been departure, and they so are students, beginning new phases of our lives, leaving behind the iconic Old North, oldest higher education building in Oklahoma, dating from 1893. 

2016

For years I've painted snow scene watercolor cards for several friends on campus, but not this year. However I've photographed it a lot this year, watching its construction, and through the years. 
Old North was often the first thing I saw early in the morning as I arrived on campus, lit by the rising sun, or in the evening, silhouetted by the setting sun. Departures.
But  this year has been important for it as well. After sitting vacant since 2001 because it was unsafe, it reopened this fall, rebuilt inside, and added on to as well, the result of lot s of fundraising and committed administrative leadership. It is once again a showcase of the promise of education, including excellent art and photographs, the latest technology, and classrooms full of students. 
Anybody who has attended UCO in its various name changes through the years probably has stories to tell, because there are literally thousands of people who have had classes inside this former teacher's college--including me.
Here is last year's painting, and some photos I took walking around  campus in May, and some from earlier years. Departures.

(Day 16 of 31 December paintings)

Icon  of education

The new and old, and Chickasaw Plaza

Sunrise 

Sunset

Campus beauty

From UCO archives

From UCO archives