Announcer: The Missouri State Journal, a weekly program keeping you in touch with Missouri State University. Emily Yeap: Communication Week is a signature event for Missouri State University's Department of Communication. It focuses on highlighting communication, teaching and research, as well as bringing together students, alumni and community members to network. This year, the week-long event themed Make Your Missouri Statement will take place on campus from February 21st to 24th. I'm Emily Yeap. Dr. Shawn Wahl, Missouri State's Department Head and Professor of Communication is my guest today. He's here to talk about what's in store for Communication Week 2017. Shawn Wahl: Several highlights of Communication Week 2017 are our international scholars that come in from across the nation and then we of course have three distinguished alums who come back to Missouri State University to share their story, or to share the statement that they've made in various industries. To tell you a little bit about two of the scholars that we have coming in, one of those communication researchers is Dr. Jeff Child from Kent State University. He's widely published in a variety of communication areas. Another scholar is Dr. Scott Myers. He's a professor at West Virginia University. Both Dr. Child and Dr. Myers, as well as other scholars we have coming in are leaders in the discipline. This is really great for our students to connect with people who write their textbooks. It also gives them a chance to connect with scholars who actually write the theories and publish research related to the curriculum that they're studying in the communication major. One of the other highlights is that we have three distinguished alums who are coming back to Missouri State. These three alums, one of them is from Springfield. Then, the other two alums both have very good jobs in St. Louis. The benefit that has for students is they can see what they're doing with a communication major or with a communication minor. It gives them a networking opportunity to meet people who are working in various industries related to communication. That's one of the things that's really going to drive home our theme this year. As we celebrate Make Your Missouri Statement, part of that celebration is bringing in alums who can share their success stories who have made their statement. Emily Yeap: The presentations will be held from 11:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. each day in Plaster Student Union, Ballroom East. Lunch is provided. Shawn Wahl: We're really excited about the Keynote Luncheon Speaker Series. This give people in the community an opportunity to not only have free lunch, but also to learn about successful Missouri State University alums who are working in various industries, and for those community members or any student on campus who's interested in making that connection with a communication researcher, or taking on any communication question that they might have. It's a learning experience and an opportunity for us to showcase what we do in the Department of Communication and how our department is connected nationally in terms of our network that we have. Emily Yeap: Wahl says Communication Week activities enable students to engage with communication researchers. Shawn Wahl: The benefit the students have in terms of connecting with communication researchers is its topics. It's theories of communication or particular learning objectives within our communication major curriculum. It gives the students an opportunity to actually meet communication researchers who they read about in their textbooks, or various theories that they study within their classes. The other thing that we've noticed with students is that it gives them an external perspective which is really important, and it gives them the ability to connect with lead scholars in the nation, to ask them questions about graduate school, getting a job after school and those sorts of topics. That's been really meaningful. Emily Yeap: While the event is organized with students in mind, community members are also encouraged to participate. Shawn Wahl: We have many people who may be interested in a question about communication related to their interpersonal relationships, related to communication within their families. Many of the topics connect to some of those questions that anyone in everyday life, those questions that we have about maybe communication in the workplace, communication in the family. It gives them an opportunity to ask questions and explore that with people from across the nation who are experts. Emily Yeap: For more information, visit calendar.missouristate.edu. I'm Emily Yeap for the Missouri State Journal. Announcer: For more information, contact the Office of University Communications at 417-836-6397. The Missouri State Journal is available online at ksmu.org.