By Skylar Dorr
The atmosphere on college campuses has become a bit tense recently, and it has everything to do with discourse and demonstrations. As major world events make their way to campus conversations, it’s not uncommon to find that students are becoming more vocal about their opinions on certain matters, and it can cause some pretty heavy debates.
As of this semester, a new communications course is being offered at Adelphi titled “Let's Talk About It: Inter-Personal Communication, Free Speech and Campus Conversations.” This class offers students an opportunity to participate in tough conversations with fellow peers who may or may not disagree with them, and also allows them to learn how to comfortably participate in discourse.
“The idea for it came out of some conversations in meetings that I was attending last winter,” said Communications Professor Peggy Cassidy, who is currently teaching the course. “That got me into conversation with [Assistant Vice President of Student Affairs and Dean of Students] Joseph De Gearo.”
As demonstrations for various causes were taking place on college campuses around the nation, Cassidy became interested in whether Adelphi itself was doing their part in putting people with different perspectives in dialogue with one another, which is something that De Gearo was also interested in.
“Developing this class was a way for me to connect faculty expertise with this experiential opportunity that I wanted to provide, which was helping students understand and practice freedom of expression,” De Gearo said.
The course plans to include the study, practice and eventual implementation of various communication theories and concepts, such as the aforementioned interpersonal communication and conflict resolution, but also verbal and non-verbal communication and general semantics. While that may sound complex, it’s simply an amalgamation of different ways to exchange information with others and learning to be more open to the ideas and thoughts of other people, even if it doesn’t align with your own views.
“It’s not always about changing your mind,” Cassidy said, “but at least being open to the possibility that we could refine our views by listening openly to someone else’s perspective.”
Some students, like junior communications major Riki Cohen, have found that even though they didn’t know what to expect initially, the class has exceeded expectations.
“So far, the content has been engaging and useful to not only today’s time but in regards to past history as well,” Cohen said. “I think it’s important to learn these lessons and tools before entering the real world to ensure you’re educated and respectful when engaging with others.”
There are also plans and preparations to integrate the course with demonstrations occurring on campus. “I do want to take advantage of whatever might be happening on campus,” said Cassidy, “just to see how the people involved with them try to engage with whoever’s walking by… to take that step out and see how people reach out to others.”
Earlier this month, students taking the course were invited by Cassidy to observe a demonstration held outside of the University Center by the Panthers for Progress and Students for Justice in Palestine, so as to get a glimpse into how a demonstration is run.
According to De Gearo, getting students in an environment like this to observe campus demonstrations is a great case study opportunity for them.
“It’d be great to get students in the class to observe one of these events, and look for opportunities to evaluate or dissect what they’re looking at,” he said. “Then you get to have conversations about how, for example, the rhetoric the protesters are using impacts the event itself.”
Though the class is currently taking place this semester, there are in fact plans to either continue this course in the future or implement other courses that deal with similar content. So it’s not too late to keep an eye on new communications classes on the horizon that’ll teach you a thing or two about how to hear people out and be heard in return.
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