Center for Communication, Culture, and Change
2014-2015 Annual Report
I am grateful to have been granted the opportunity to direct the Center for Communication, Culture, and
Change and to advance the scholarship of faculty across the School of Communication as well. This report
reflects progress from August 2014 to May 2015.
The Center for Communication, Culture, and Change
Infrastructure: During the last academic year, new policies have emphasized transparency in the
management of the Center.
 Forms and processes were revised for applying for Center pilot project funds. These awards are
designed to encourage interdisciplinary research teams and increase prospects for external funding.
 An internal advisory board was created, consisting of representatives of each department (Sam
Terilli, Christina Lane, Kim Grinfeder, Sunny Tsai, and Soyoon Kim). The board provides input on new
policies and makes funding decisions on pilot project applications.
 The Center’s budget has been distributed to the internal advisory board. Permission has been given
to all representatives on the board to share the budget with any SOC faculty member.
 Course buyout policies were established for faculty who apply for external grant funding.
Internal funding mechanism: The 4C has awarded pilot funds in the past. However, several changes have
been made.
 The criteria for pilot funding now require that proposals (1) represent collaborations between
faculty from two or more departments within the School and (2) work toward the goal of external
funding support. There will be at least two opportunities for faculty to submit per academic year in
recognition of the realities of how collaborative projects develop and progress.
 Four projects have been submitted for the first deadline (January 30, 2015). All four projects were
funded, for a total just under $20,000. A second round of funding will be awarded in early May, 2015.
One project was funded in that round. Future funding deadlines will be set for the last Friday of
September, January, and April, at 5 pm.
Interdisciplinary project teams: Several SOC interdisciplinary teams have emerged that show promise for
securing external funding either directly or through project extensions. These include:
 Evaluation of serious games: Faculty from three departments (COS, CIM, and Strat Comm) and one
doctoral student are working together to conduct a comprehensive evaluation of serious games with
the goal to identify the formal message features of games that lead to effectiveness.
 Cancer Communication Lab: A collaboration with faculty members at Sylvester Cancer Center has
resulted in funding salary support funding (for Nick Carcioppolo) as well as 15K in pilot funds to
support development and data collection. Several cancer communication projects are under
development including improved materials that will lead to more efficacious colorectal cancer
screening among underserved populations, and a redesign of Sylvester’s clinical trials website.
 Clinical trial decision aid: SOC faculty from three departments (COS, CIM, and Strategic Comm) are
working with Margaret Byrne (Sylvester) to redesign and pilot test an online decision aid for newly
diagnosed cancer patients. Particular attention will be given to variables delineated by
communication theories of information seeking and processing.
 The Clinical Translational Sciences Institute has provided an additional $42K to support the
development of patient-centered website that will present information about clinical trials that are
available through the Sylvester Cancer Center. Funding will support an MFA student who will be
helping construct the website. Several additional doctoral students and Interactive Media MFA
students will also be part of the team and will assist in generating site content and conducting
evaluations of site effectiveness in increasing patient enrollment in clinical trials.
Another interdisciplinary teams is in the early stages of formation:

Entertainment education: Ed Talavera has agreed to direct and produce an entertainment education
mini-series set in Miami which will address cancer health disparities that affect the Latino
population. COS faculty, SOC doctoral students (Occa, Yang, Wendorf, plus incoming student
Anderson), and Cinema MFA students will also be part of this team.
Sponsored speakers, colloquia, workshops, and seminars:
 General Salamanca presentation and visit: This visit was the culmination of a collaboration between
the Colombian National Police and UM’s Professor Lien Tran, doctoral student Jessica Wendorf, and
FIU’s Dr. Maria Elena Villar to develop an intervention to address the commercial sexual exploitation
of children. General Salamanca also met with UM faculty and administrators to discuss future
collaborations.
 Flourish Klink: Ms. Klink is a transmedia producer for East Los High, an English-language
entertainment education program targeting social and behavior change targeting Latinos. She
provided us with an example of how faculty in social science can effectively collaborate with
filmmakers, writers & producers to create social change through an entertainment education
approach.
 FIT/Miami Do Tank (co-sponsorship): This was a conference designed to foster innovative,
interdisciplinary thinking to improve disaster preparedness in Miami in which Professor Tran used a
serious game to facilitate collaborative processes on this issue.
 Youth Forum on Climate Change and Water (co-sponsorship): This event featured Professor Sanjeev
Chatterjee’s film, “One Water for Sustainable Development” as well as student-led discussions about
climate change.
 Grant writing workshops: During the Fall 2014 semester, we hosted four grant-writing workshops
for faculty and grad students that were each attended by 25-30 people. The workshops included an
overview of external funding options, an introduction to locating and applying for federal funding, an
introduction to foundation funding (which was conducted by UM foundation and corporate relations
staff), and pointers for persuasive grant writing.
 Grant writing seminar: A grant writing seminar was offered during Spring semester, which paired 13
graduate students with faculty members to identify appropriate grant funding opportunities and
create viable first drafts of a proposal for a federal funding source in each faculty member’s area of
expertise.
Visiting Knight Chair
 We have hired Lynn Cherney to be the Visiting Knight Chair for 2015-2016. She will be working
closely with Alberto Cairo on a number of projects. In addition to teaching undergraduate classes in
Journalism, she will offer a series of exciting workshops on innovative data analysis and presentation
techniques.
Long-term goals:
Foster a culture of research, discovery, and creative activity in the School of Communication
 Increase the number of faculty conducting interdisciplinary research and creative activity within SOC
and across UM
 Expand Center membership to graduate students and all UM faculty
 Increase internal pilot funding to support SOC faculty research
o Work with faculty (and UM administrative procedures) to increase number and proportion of
Provost’s Research Awards awarded to SOC faculty
 Increase external funding to support SOC faculty research
o Workshops and training related to grant funding, research and creative methodologies, and
the publication process
o Facilitate opportunities for SOC faculty to serve as co-Investigators on external funding
proposals
Conduct a grant writing retreat for collaborating faculty who are well-positioned to create a
viable external funding proposals
o Visit grant funding agencies and foundations (about every 18 months), focusing strategically
on those that are a good fit for faculty interests
o Investigate the feasibility of developing a social science grant incubator where funded faculty
help unfunded faculty develop viable grant proposals. (This would be coordinated with the
Assistant Vice Provost for Research.)
Increase financial support for 4C
o Salary savings from members’ funded external proposals
o Contract work done by 4C faculty
o
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