Gale Auletta Young

Annenberg/CPB funds electronic multicultural communities project

Sometimes a grant that doesn't make it for one funder fits well with another. That's what Gale Auletta Young, Professor of Speech Communication at California State University, Hayward, discovered when her proposal, "Creating Electronic Multicultural Communities: Connecting Curriculum and Campuses," was funded by The Annenberg/CPB Project.

Young, whose specialty is intercultural communication, has for the past eleven years been Co-Director of the Center for the Study of Intercultural Relations at CSU, Hayward. The Center's interdisciplinary group of faculty came together because of an initial grant but stayed together to exchange ideas, support each other's work, and create joint projects. Their work had resulted in two conferences, a special issue of American Behavioral Scientist, a volume of essays, and a consulting and training service focusing on issues relating to intercultural and interracial relations.

Lately, Young noticed, multiculturalism moved away from the national agenda and that funding was shifting toward technology issues. The Center's faculty tried to take advantage of that shift by combining their interests with technological concerns, but, as Young noted, "It's difficult, because the content is such an emotional issue." They shopped ideas around, with no luck. Then, they wrote a proposal for the U.S. Department of Education's Fund for the Improvement of Postsecondary Education (FIPSE), and while their proposal wasn't funded it did make the finalist group.

When the Annenberg/CPB Project issued their 1994 call for proposals one of their initiatives was labeled, "Rethinking courses--sharing information about technology, technology-based materials, and teaching." Young and Terry Jones, Professor of Sociology and Social Services, and the other Co-Director of the Center, decided to rework their FIPSE proposal to meet the Annenberg/CPB specifications. Of the 36 proposals that were initially submitted, Annenberg expressed interest in nine. Young and Jones' proposal was among that group.

Feedback from Annenberg/CPB reviewers indicated that the authors needed to insure strong participation from at least three different institutions. At this phase of the project, Young credits her local grants office and her Provost for smoothing the way. "We got a lot of support quickly. We were taken seriously because we had been FIPSE finalists," she said. Young also credited Jolene Koester and Sidney Ribeau, intercultural communication specialists who are also Provosts at California State University, Sacramento, and California State Polytechnic University, Pomona, respectively, for moving quickly and decisively to get their campuses involved and for convincing other Provosts in the Cal State system to cooperate. By responding to the grantor's concerns strongly and substantively, the proposal was one of the ones funded by Annenberg/CPB.

The project that Annenberg/CPB funded attempts to design ways to use electronic instructional technologies to strengthen the ability of universities "to prepare faculty to be both multiculturally and technologically literate and sensitive in the 21st century." Two design teams from four CSU campuses (Hayward, Sacramento, Pomona, Bakersfield) will develop two upper division courses from a multicultural perspective. These courses will be aimed to meet the CSU's General Education requirements, and will be taught at‑a‑distance using live two‑way interactive video and other electronic instructional technologies in combination with the pedagogical methods known to be the most effective for diverse learners (defined as race, gender, age, English proficiency, academic preparation and learning styles). One of the courses will focus on political expression and will be taught by Sally Murphy, Assistant Professor of Speech Communication at CSU, Hayward. The other course will focus on health and social beliefs and will be taught by a professor from the Bakersfield campus.

The project is expected to produce two products. One will be an evaluation of the distance teaching process in terms learning outcomes for the diverse group of learners. The other will be two software products, a 20‑30 minute videotape and a CD-ROM that will provide interested faculty with the necessary course curriculum materials, resources and instructional methods for each course.

Young expressed a desire to have SCA members become part of her National Scholar Response Team. This group of 100 individuals will respond to drafts of the project three to four times during the next year and a half, in exchange for receiving the videotape and the CD-ROM once they have completed. To volunteer for this team, contact Young at the Department of Speech Communication, California State University, Hayward, Hayward, California 94542, or e-mail her at gyoung@s1.csuhayward.edu.