Thursday, January 20, 2011

21st CENTURY LITERACIES

It is becoming increasingly clear that in order to compete in today's technology driven publishing world, an aspiring communicator will have to have a strong knowledge of the current ways of transferring information.  It's no longer acceptable just to know how to update your status on Facebook.  A literate person has to know how to use Facebook in order to its full capacity in order to advance the presence, ideas and agenda of her company.

I came kicking and screaming to the new technology, especially social media.  But, now I understand how instrumental it can be.  Through these outlets, I have established not only lasting friendships, but business contacts that will help me once I graduate. 

It's also amazing the amount of information that is available.  If someone wanted to get news from all over the country or world , they would have to subscribe to different newspapers or get watered down versions from a national news organization.  Now it's possible to go online, to any city, state, country or continent and tap in directly to their media. 

Learning the technology is easier than ever.  There are several resources available that can teach how to set up websites, create media outlets and better utilize social networks.  There is no excuse to be left behind.

Tuesday, January 18, 2011

READING

At my last place of employment, the employees in my department were broken up into teams and each team had a leader.  One of the tasks of the team leader was to send out an email to her team in regards to goals, things that needed improvement and any new updates that we needed to know.  Each time I read one of her emails, I saw that they were riddled with grammatical and spelling errors.  So one day, I was sitting at my desk reading, as I always did when I was on my break or during down time, and she asked me about the book I was reading and so forth and she said "I have never been into reading that much". 

Whenever I hear someone say that, which happens more often than I care to admit, it sounds foreign to me.  But the thing that really clicked was the correlation between her lack of reading and her lack of writing skills.  I always hear politicians and social commentators speaking about how we are not competitive in the world and they want to push math an science.  But no one ever really pushes reading and the link between being a solid reader and a good communicator.

Crain's observations are really not that surprising.  We are a culture of instant gratification and books simply do not meet that need most of the time.  When you turn to your favorite TV show, you are instantly pleased.  When you put on your favorite music, you are instantly overtaken with some sort of emotion whether it be romance, excitement or even the blues.  Video games, sports, shopping, eating - all bring instant pleasure.  But books are an investment in time and patience which we just don't seem to have anymore.

Monday, January 17, 2011

HI!

As you can see by my blog title, my name is Felicia.  I am a senior majoring in English. 

This semester, I will be interning in the PR department at the School of the Arts. 

And that's me...for now.