0:06: Hello and welcome to Global Connections, the podcast that brings international student experiences, stories, and resources to the forefront at the University of San Francisco. 
 0:16: I'm your host, Rashi Pat, and today we're diving into one of the most valuable academic support systems on campus, the Learning, Writing and Speaking Centers, also known as LWSC. 
 0:27: So whether you're looking for tutoring, writing consultants, academic coaching, or public speaking support, LWSC offers a range of services designed to help students succeed. 
 0:38: And for international students, these resources can be especially helpful in navigating the academic challenges of studying in a new environment. 
 0:46: In this episode, we'll be speaking with the directors of LWSC Kimberly Rutledge, Jonathan Hunt, and Philip Chung, respectively, who will. 
 0:55: Give us an inside look at the mission and services of their centers. 
 0:59: We'll also hear from students staff members Jia Lee, who works at the front desk, Wen Lee, an academic skills development coach, and Joy, a writing consultant to get a student perspective on the impact of these resources. 
 1:13: So whether you're a new student looking for academic support or just curious about what LWSC has to offer, this episode is for you. 
 1:21: Let's get started. 
 1:22: We're excited to welcome and begin with someone who oversees the learning center and the resources they offer, Kimberly Rutledge, the director of the Learning Center. 
 1:32: Hi Kim, thank you for joining us today. 
 1:34: Can you start by introducing yourself and sharing a bit about your role at LWSC? 
 1:39: Yes, hello, I am Kim Rutledge, and I'm the director of the Learning center. 
 1:45: the Learning Center is, co-located with the writing and speaking centers. 
 1:51: So my role as the learning center director is to, you know, sort of oversee the coordination and promotion. 
 1:57: Of learning center services and then our staff also supports, you know, provides some administrative support for the writing and speaking centers like, you know, it allows students to call one place. 
 2:14: or go on to one system to schedule learning, writing or speaking center appointments. 
 2:20: So, the LWSC plays such an essential role in supporting students academically. 
 2:25: Our vision is to empower students to achieve their academic and personal goals through opportunities for enhanced learning interpersonal development, personal responsibility and leadership, and our three core functions. 
 2:41: At the learning center are to provide course-specific academic support, to provide academic skills development, initiatives, and to provide high impact leadership and engagement opportunities. 
 2:55: So we are providing peer to peer support to students to provide that courses specific academic support. 
 3:04: we provide Workshops, academic sales coaching, and we, have lots of, online resources available to students. 
 3:14: , to provide the academic skill development and then, as I mentioned, we are using peer to peer support. 
 3:23: We're using peer to peer support, so other students, at USF are providing, most of the services and so you can provide, you can, you'll find peers working in the writing center, the speaking center, and the learning center. 
 3:43: So as we know, international students often face unique academic challenges. 
 3:49: So whether this is about adjusting to a new education system, maybe linguistic barriers, or developing confidence in their writing, speaking, and even differences in their learning styles. 
 4:02: So, how does LWSE specifically support maybe international students in navigating some of these challenges? 
 4:09: So the learning center has an academic skills coaching service called Academic English Sport specifically for international students and those students who first language is not English. 
 4:26: so students can or international students can make a one on one appointment. 
 4:33: , appointments are about an hour in length, and, students can work with, the, the coach, talk about, you know, effective communication with their professors, how to, they'll work on developing specific study strategies. 
 4:52: It could be reading, note taking. 
 4:54: , critical thinking, just really helping, students understand what goes into being successful, in the US or USF specific, classroom. 
 5:11: students can make multiple appointments with their academic English support coaches. 
 5:16: so if they're looking for someone who can just serve as an accountability coach for them. 
 5:21: , they can set up weekly appointments with our AES, coaches. 
 5:28: Besides that, our coaches can also support students in, working on their time management and organization, their tests and exam prep, motivation and goal setting, learning style development, and some academic, some active study, techniques. 
 5:48: Any questions that you have, we want you to come in and and ask it. 
 5:54: , feel comfortable coming in, and, and asking it. 
 5:58: So thank you so much. 
 5:59: All of these resources seem really helpful and approachable, especially for international students, right, because they're already navigating having to adapt to this being here in a new country and then being at an academic space in higher education along with learning about How they're expected to be as students here in America. 
 6:25: So having some of these resources available to them makes that transition just that much more welcoming and that much more supportive. 
 6:35: So thank you so much for going over those for us, Kim. 
 6:38: Sure, thank you. 
 6:40: and then for students who might feel a little hesitant or unsure about using the LWSE. 
 6:48: Services, what would you say to encourage them to reach out and make an appointment? 
 6:53: sometimes, back in their home culture, there might be a little bit of a taboo, or judgment in reaching out to services that, you know, have supplemental instructions. 
 7:05: So would you want to speak to a little bit towards that? 
 7:08: Well, here, here's what I typically say, to students who are hesitant. 
 7:15: I say you gotta study anyway, right? 
 7:19: most students, they are typically looking for a peer or someone else to study with, someone to ask questions of, so why not come to the learning center, the writing center, the speaking centers. 
 7:33: , you know, we are always available to provide support to students. 
 7:40: we invite students to schedule regular appointments with us, whether it's, peer tutoring, writing center appointments, speaking center appointments. 
 7:50: You can come to us on a weekly, basis to develop your skills, to practice, just as you do with the, the folks in your class, just as you do with Your professors and with your teaching assistants. 
 8:07: you know, if you're hesitant, I say just give it a try once. 
 8:13: we always Love to see new students coming in to our centers and, you know, just giving us a try. 
 8:22: So thank you so much for making time and joining us today. 
 8:25: Thank you, Rashi. 
 8:26: Thanks for having me. 
 8:27: And now that we've heard from Kim about the incredible resources available at LWSC, let's switch gears and hear from students, staff members who play a direct role in supporting students. 
 8:39: We're excited to welcome Wen Lee, an academic skills development coach. 
 8:43: Hello and welcome, Wen. 
 8:45: Do you mind telling us a little bit about yourself, your program of study, and where you're from? 
 8:50: Of course, thanks for having me. 
 8:53: my name is Wen. 
 8:54: I'm originally from China and I'm a 5th year doctoral student at the School of Education. 
 9:01: this is my 5th year at the USF and this is my 4th year working at a learning center. 
 9:08: , and currently I work at the Learning Writing Speaking Center as a academic skills coach, where I support students individually to help them address their academic struggles and develop solutions to their problems. 
 9:24: Awesome, excellent. 
 9:26: Thank you for joining us and welcome to the podcast. 
 9:29: So as an ASD coach, you play a unique role in helping students develop their academic skills. 
 9:35: So can you share what about your job entails, supporting them in their academic journey and how students, probably come to you for direction about time management, study strategies, test preparation. 
 9:49: And topics around that nature yeah, of course, like I shared a little bit earlier, this is my 4th year working at the learning center and I first joined the learning center as a project success coach, which is similar to the role I'm in right now. 
 10:05: So I give students, I provide academic support to students individually. 
 10:10: This is different from the tutoring that, peer tutoring. 
 10:13: , program we offer at the learning center. 
 10:17: This is more like a focus on long term support and like I said, we give students, we provide them with the learning strategies rather than specific subject, instruction, and I feel like in my role I really help students with a lot of academic struggles like you said earlier, the time management. 
 10:38: Procrastination, exam preparation, goal setting, those are a lot of topics we touched on and work with students. 
 10:46: , we have a wonderful website contains all the information and the resources we have, and I would say the most, the top the top three topics I ever worked with students, they are, number 1 is time management, number 2 is exam exam preparation, and number 3 is going to be learning styles. 
 11:08: I, I do have students approach to us asking how can I learn better, how can I process. 
 11:14: Process the knowledge better and we do have tons of resources that we can provide with them. 
 11:21: so currently I'm working with Kang, another wonderful coach for this program. 
 11:27: She offers in-person sessions on campus, I believe like with a lot of availabilities. 
 11:33: I I mostly offer online sessions. 
 11:36: I do not. 
 11:37: I do, I'm a bilingual as a bilingual speaker myself, so I. 
 11:42: Of not only sessions in Chinese, but also in English so I can do sessions in both languages. 
 11:49: And we do last semester, we do have a lot of international students, international students, especially those international students from China joining us. 
 11:59: we even had a workshop together discussing what are some things that would be of their interest and also what are some struggles they faced and how we can better support them. 
 12:10: So what are some of the most common challenges that students come to you with, and then how do you help them address some of these concerns? 
 12:18: I know you mentioned that learning styles comes up quite often, the learning styles that they're familiar with, maybe in their home country might be different than the ones that professors try and encourage here in the US. 
 12:32: So is that something that you're commonly come across? 
 12:35: Yeah, yeah, so I worked with, I mean, the ASC sessions, they are open to all students on campus. 
 12:43: So I've worked with, mostly they are undergraduate students, some of them are graduate students, we also have students, doctoral students joining us to talk about how they can learn better for international students. 
 12:55: Just like what you said earlier, they came to the country with a whole different cultural background and the learning styles. 
 13:04: for example, like myself, when I was in China, we learned things differently than here. 
 13:10: I feel like when we go into the classroom, we just sit in and listen to what the professor said that take notes, then prepare for the task that's it. 
 13:19: But here you have to be prepared for group discussion, you have to be prepared for the office hours, those things that's not well situated in our own culture actually brings a lot of changes to the international students and from my previous experience working with them, I also felt like How to manage the time better is also a big challenge for them because I felt like here you have to be responsible to your own studies. 
 13:49: It's not like when you're back in your home country, you have your parents, you have your professors, you know, just chase after you, tell you all the time like nagging on, oh, do this, do that, but here you have to, you know, take initiatives to do things by yourself. 
 14:04: So I felt, I personally felt like working on those time management. 
 14:09: Star plan really helps students and also we have resources to use students' confidence on how to communicate with their professors, how to prepare for their office hours, and also if you want to be more advanced in the college, if you want to conduct your research, we also offer all those resources that can really help them to adapt to the different learning culture here. 
 14:37: Awesome, that sounds lovely. 
 14:39: And for our international students listening in, would you tell them that it's a fairly easy process to approach getting a coach like you or maybe if they want to meet up with Kulan in person, is there anything that you'd like to tell them that they might feel encouraged to come speak with an ASC coach like yourself? 
 15:00: Yeah, yeah, I really encourage all our international students to schedule an appointment either with me or with Kula to really take advantage of our services. 
 15:12: If you are new to the learning center, I would say if you're browsing that website and you feel like, oh, there are tons of the act. 
 15:20: support programs, but I don't know which one suits you. 
 15:22: I really encourage you to go with academic skills coach first, because we are, we provide the session that we can better look at the problems and also the struggles you are having right now and we can refer you and guide you to choose the right resources and the support for you. 
 15:42: And then there is not a complicated process. 
 15:45: You can just go to the website. 
 15:47: , making an appointment. 
 15:49: We, we also have a little bubble chat box there down at the website as well where you can get a hold of the front desk staff members to also, scheduled for an appointment with us. 
 16:05: So it's not a complicated, not a complicated process. 
 16:10: and also me at my cashier earlier, Kulon offers tons of in-person sessions and I do have a lot of availabilities for online sessions on Zoom. 
 16:20: Awesome, thank you so much, Wen. 
 16:22: Your work at LWSC is making such a difference for students, and we appreciate you sharing your experiences with us. 
 16:30: And I know you started to mention a front desk worker helping you, so we'll now switch over to talk with Gia. 
 16:36: Hello and welcome, Jia. 
 16:37: We'll now hear from another staff member who plays a Key role in making LWSC an accessible and welcoming space. 
 16:45: Gia works at the front desk and she also assists students in a multitude of ways. 
 16:50: We're so excited to hear from her today. 
 16:54: so please introduce yourself, tell us a little bit about the program, where you're from, and your staff position here at LWSC. 
 17:01: Hello, everyone. 
 17:01: My name is Jolly. 
 17:03: I am a 3 biology major and I am from Saipan, Northern Mariana Island. 
 17:09: I am one of the frontest member of the Learning, Writing and Speaking Center. 
 17:13: Our center provides like a wide variety of like tutoring service, writing, service, and speaking service if you ever need help. 
 17:23: Awesome, thank you so much and welcome. 
 17:25: We're so excited to have you on our podcast today. 
 17:28: So the center has such a wide array of resources and programs for students, and when people walk into our office, you at the front desk are probably the first staff member that they interact with. 
 17:39: So do you mind telling us about your job duties or different ways that you're able to assist students when they seek resources at LWLC? 
 17:47: Yeah, so my duties at the front desk, including helping students. 
 17:51: Booking an appointment, informing students with the tutoring, writing, and speaking service that our center provides and help answer any questions or concerns a a student or tutor might have. 
 18:04: And many times I will get like a phone call where students will be calling to ask about like the writing center and seek, and they will see like a consultant that best fits their writing needs and so I will assist with that as well. 
 18:20: Awesome. 
 18:20: So it seems like you not only help students get checked in, but also the coaches, they're kind of providing assistance to both, both sides of the student population and help them get connected to the resources or help them get connected to one another, essentially. 
 18:37: that seems like a very integral part of the whole functioning system. 
 18:42: what questions do you most often get from the ones like the students that just walk into the office? 
 18:50: Yeah, so, questions I get will be like, hey, I am looking to book an appointment for a specific course, and can you help me make this appointment? 
 18:59: And so oftentimes we encourage students to make their own appointments so that they are familiar with the resources and the students have that they are accessing to book the appointments or if they they need help with like troubleshooting, we will go ahead and help them book the appointment, on behalf of them, and then if there is like a specific course, but you do not see any availability, we will also go ahead and ask the students to submit a request form for the course that they are looking to tutor for. 
 19:32: Oh, interesting. 
 19:33: So if there is a course that maybe a student is wanting to get tutoring towards, for example, let's say environmental science is a particularly, ones sometimes for students and it might not currently have any coaches assigned to it. 
 19:49: There is a form online that they can fill out to request, a coach or a tutor to be assigned to it. 
 19:56: You're pretty far away from home. 
 19:57: Do you want to tell us a little bit about where you're from? 
 20:00: Yeah, sure. 
 20:01: the other day actually at my creative writing class, I shared with my class at Saipan, it's just like a small. 
 20:09: on the map and then you might not even like notice it sometimes. 
 20:13: But Saipan is a US territory. 
 20:16: It's right next to Guam. 
 20:18: And so a lot of people heard about Guam. 
 20:19: It's also an island as well. 
 20:21: But then Saipan is like hot all year round. 
 20:24: And then everything, is very culturally diverse here. 
 20:28: We have like people from all over the world, as well as the native people there. 
 20:35: And then, so yeah, I flew for the shortest flight I've taken is at least like 24 hours from Saipan to San Francisco and then in between, I will also have like layovers maybe at like Japan or Hawaii before I can get to San Francisco. 
 20:52: That indeed is all the way around the world and very, very far away. 
 20:57: thank you so much for sharing your experiences and I'm glad that you can still find the small community here, despite your family being so far away at the learning center. 
 21:08: it's been great hearing from you. 
 21:10: Thank you so much for making time, Jia, and thank you for all that you do for the learning, writing and speaking centers and help make these resources available for our students here at USL. 
 21:22: So next, we're shifting our focus to another incredible resource within an LWSC, the Writing Center. 
 21:28: Writing is a crucial skill, whether it's for coursework, research papers, or even professional development. 
 21:34: The writing center provides invaluable support for students at all levels. 
 21:38: I'm excited to welcome Jonathan Hunt, the director of the Writing Center at USF along with Joy, a peer coach and the writing center and an international student from China. 
 21:50: Welcome, Jonathan and Joy. 
 21:52: Thank you both for joining us today. 
 21:54: To start, could you please introduce yourselves and tell us a little bit about your roles? 
 21:58: , sure, yeah, thanks for inviting us. 
 22:01: I am, I'm Jonathan Hunt. 
 22:03: I'm a professor in the rhetoric and language department here at USF. 
 22:08: I've been at USF for a little more than 10 years, and, I've had a long standing interest in writing centers. 
 22:15: I've worked in writing centers for a number of years at other institutions and here at USF. 
 22:21: So when the opportunity came to, step into the director's role. 
 22:25: I was really excited to do that. 
 22:28: And one of the biggest priorities for me was, getting undergraduate peer coaches into the writing center. 
 22:36: We had a staff of faculty consultants, but I felt like, we were missing, undergraduate voices in that, in that peer coach role. 
 22:44: And so happily, Joy was among. 
 22:47: The first cohort of undergraduate peer coaches to join us in the writing center. 
 22:51: Hi, everyone. 
 22:52: My name is Joy. 
 22:54: I'm a peer coach with the Writing Center, and I'm an international student from China and I'm studying communication studies here at USF. 
 23:03: Prior to working with the Writing Center, I've also had some experiences tutoring people with Their English and their English assignments. 
 23:12: So it is a great opportunity for me to work with both American students and students whose English was not their primary language with their work assignments here at USF. 
 23:26: I see. 
 23:26: So you've had experience working with both domestic students and international students and you kind of navigate like different skills that they'd want you to help them brush up on. 
 23:35: That's awesome. 
 23:36: , and Jonathan, writing can be a challenge for many students, whether it's organizing their ideas or refining arguments, improving clarity and grammar. 
 23:47: do you mind giving us an overview of the writing center's actual mission towards some of these skills and what kind of services it provides to the students? 
 23:55: Yeah, thanks. 
 23:56: That's a great question. 
 23:57: And in fact, I think writing can be difficult for almost all humans. 
 24:02: it's, it's a very difficult to master compared to how we learn to speak, for example. 
 24:09: So, and, a small, very small child will start talking. 
 24:13: Just on their own by being around people speaking. 
 24:16: But we spend years and years learning to write. 
 24:19: And in fact, it's a lifetime of increasing our mastery and ability. 
 24:24: So we all have room to grow as writers. 
 24:28: and the writing center is there to help. 
 24:31: we support and celebrate all writers and writing at USF. 
 24:37: So, we're here to help with any stage of any project. 
 24:41: So most students bring in assigned essays from their coursework, but people also bring in creative work that they're working on in their own time. 
 24:53: Working with their like assigned rhetoric class, which is a required class, so we often see first or second year students bringing in work, they're new to academic writing at the university level, and they might be new to the what the rhetoric class is asking of them. 
 25:09: But we also see, you know, STEM students doing a capstone project. 
 25:13: So they're very expert writers at the undergraduate level. 
 25:18: And as expert writers, they understand how important it is to get other voices and other eyeballs on your writing. 
 25:26: So we can help with brainstorming a project before you've even gotten started. 
 25:30: We call that the pre-writing phase, and we can also help with that, you know, putting, putting the dot in the dragon's eye, as they say, like putting that last final touch to make it really bring it alive. 
 25:42: We, we try to help everybody with everything and, as Joy said, Any person in the writing center, any coach or consultant has training in in dealing with any project that can that can come that that can come through the door. 
 25:57: And, many international students are writing English as second or even third languages, which can sometimes add an extra layer of complexity. 
 26:07: So how does the writing center specifically support international students in developing some of these writing skills. 
 26:14: Yeah, we're, we're aware of the, the different needs that, people writing in a second or third language. 
 26:20: And I myself was an international student as a graduate student and have experience writing, trying to write part of my dissertation in a, in a second language. 
 26:30: So we understand how challenging that can be. 
 26:33: We try to meet people where they are and help them with what they're most concerned about in their own writing. 
 26:41: But we also coach students to think, More deeply about, what their larger goals are in their own growth as a writer over the long term. 
 26:55: So many students naturally in our experience are really focused on the professor's expectation on this specific project that they've brought in. 
 27:05: , and we also try to help people see it as a growth opportunity in their longer journey, as a writer as well, and not specifically on, not only specifically on that specific project. 
 27:17: We can develop it over time. 
 27:19: Yeah, that makes complete sense. 
 27:20: Thank you. 
 27:22: and it's great that the writing center also offers a level of personalization, through their assistance. 
 27:28: So Joy, as a peer coach and an international student yourself, your work. 
 27:32: Directly with students in writing consultation kind of adds to this. 
 27:37: Do you mind sharing what your role involves and how you support students in their writing process that Jonathan just spoke about? 
 27:44: So a typical section for me would look like a student coming in with a draft that they have for an assignment that their professor assigned. 
 27:56: And normally I would ask for their assignment sheet. 
 28:00: And that way they, they can kind of explain why they're writing this paper, what they're trying to aim at. 
 28:06: And I'm also, usually I will also ask for previous feedback from that professor, and we'll try to kind of brainstorm and go through what exactly does the professor want you to improve and what exactly do you have to look for in this current assignment that we're working with. 
 28:24: And usually the student would want me to give some very specific feedback on how to change a particular sentence or how to change particular wording. 
 28:35: But here at USF, the writing center, it's more focused on helping the student get confidence and get control of their own writing rather than us as writing tutors, go ahead and change their work. 
 28:51: So, Yeah, a lot of my job, I would say has to do with giving assurance to the student that they are able to do it in their own words, redirect from changing very specific wording detail to kind of getting to think about the organization and the purpose of the writing as a whole. 
 29:11: And what are some of the most sort of common questions or challenges that students bring up to the writing center? 
 29:18: , definitely the most repeated question that students bring, especially from international students would be, does my grammar look right? 
 29:28: and even though there are tools out there like grammaly where people can just input their text into the machine and it will do the, do it, do the work for them. 
 29:36: It doesn't always do the job and especially if you, your primary language has a completely grammar structure than English, then grammarly and the other AI is going to mess it up real bad. 
 29:49: And so a lot of the international students come in or even sometimes domestic students come in, they have that concern. 
 29:57: And regarding the point you said earlier of student rushing last minute with an assignment that's due within the next hour, I would actually, I will also provide help on on a case by case instance. 
 30:11: If it's a really urgent case, I would go in and help them fix some of the like the detailed wording stuff, but I would try to frame it in a way as in, you should not use this word but rather this word. 
 30:24: I will try to frame it as in a more General principle way. 
 30:30: I'll say something like, generally we don't use and at the beginning of a sentence to help them kind of like build that writing habit. 
 30:39: The logic in their writing. 
 30:42: I feel like students, especially international students, tend to be very focused on whether they are doing the sentence structure correctly, but they kind of tend to forget. 
 30:54: The most important structure is the structure of the entire essay. 
 30:59: So, one thing that I have begun to do is I began to ask for outlines that they're writing, and if they don't have one. 
 31:07: I'll try to, I'll say something like, OK, let's make one together. 
 31:11: Let's see where your logic is flowing in your essay. 
 31:15: And for the students listening in and might feel a little hesitant about sharing their writing or getting feedback, what would both of you say to encourage them to take advantage of the writing center and their resources? 
 31:28: Well, I would say, first of all, our sessions are confidential. 
 31:32: So we don't report anything to the faculty member. 
 31:35: If the student requests, we can, we can let the faculty member know that the student came in to see us as sometimes faculty members request, but, it's completely confidential, unless the student asks us to contact the professor. 
 31:50: and really I think for any, writer in an academic setting. 
 31:55: It's important to think about having kind of a team that's gonna be supporting you that can include your peers, it can include people in your in your own program or course of study it can include your professor in a specific course it can include your academic advisors as well and it can include. 
 32:14: Writing and speaking centers because we're here to sort of sit with you, and support you in reaching your own goals. 
 32:22: We're not here to give a grade or, or to, to, to tell you what to do with your paper. 
 32:28: We're here to support each student in becoming the decision maker. 
 32:32: , and the author of their own work. 
 32:35: I mean, all students have access to the writing center, so why not take advantage of it and just have your work be looked over by someone who's really good at doing this at least one time. 
 32:46: so finally, before I let you guys go, what's the one thing that excites you most about your work, at the writing center and what impact do you hope to see these services have on students here at USF and our USF community? 
 33:00: I think what excites me. 
 33:02: Me the most is that the ultimate goal of our jobs is to help students become more confident in their writing and become better writers. 
 33:14: I think that is very. 
 33:16: I like the perspective a lot because your attention wouldn't be focusing on finding the problems or the issues with someone's writing and whether it would be. 
 33:28: And a perspective of helping someone grow. 
 33:31: And another thing that I want to point out or highlight to students who might be listening is that you don't need to have like an almost final draft to come in. 
 33:42: You can come in essentially with only the assignment sheet and we can start with, we can help you at any stage of your writing essentially and You don't have to feel like you have to have something to work with us. 
 33:59: I'm, I'm a professor, so I read a lot of student work, but all of the student work I read is stuff that I myself have have assigned. 
 34:07: So it's a, it's a pretty small territory in terms of the human intellectual landscape, and working in the writing center is amazing because people bring in. 
 34:19: I, I always learned so much from the papers that students bring in, and I, I just, I'm so inspired by how excited they often are about their intellectual work, you know, whether it's a, a person working on a dissertation. 
 34:34: , about, you know, in international politics in the Balkan Peninsula or environmental sciences student talking about mercury contamination in the San Francisco Bay Area or someone analyzing a medieval work of literature, it's always fascinating to see, and to talk to students who are working through these ideas and trying to express their own, intellectual discoveries in writing. 
 35:02: So I think for me it's just It's just really fun to encounter all of the different things that students are doing here at at at USF and so so yeah, so I would second Joyce's point that At any stage of the process, we're here to talk and support, and I would encourage people to think, of course you can come in once, like if it's an emergency or any, any time you want, you're anybody's free to make, just appointments as they wish, but I would encourage folks to think about building in the writing center as just a regular part of their academic work and their writing process. 
 35:43: And, in some, if, if you're interested, we can even make set up those standing appointments that you mentioned, if that's something that, folks think would be good for their support, or you can feel free to make appointments as you, as you wish. 
 35:58: You the appointment window is 2 weeks, I think, so you can make an appointment up to 2 weeks in advance. 
 36:03: So I would just encourage people to think about having feedback from other people, including the writing center, as just a regular part of their process, and that's gonna. 
 36:13: Research suggests that that's gonna make you a more successful writer and student. 
 36:18: Yeah, definitely. 
 36:18: And I can hear both of your passion, the way you speak about this. 
 36:23: thank you so much for spending some time and talking to us about the writing center. 
 36:28: It's been great learning about the resources and the ways that it helps students become stronger and more confident writers. 
 36:35: Thank you so much. 
 36:37: But we've heard about the broader academic support services at LW. 
 36:40: USC, let's focus on a resource that can be especially beneficial for students looking to strengthen their communication skills. 
 36:48: The Speaking center. 
 36:50: I'm thrilled to welcome Phillip Chung, the director of the Speaking center here at USF. 
 36:55: thank you for joining us today. 
 36:57: To start, can you please introduce yourself and tell us a little bit about your role at the Speaking center, Philip? 
 37:04: Sure. 
 37:04: Hi, I am Phil Chung. 
 37:06: I use he and him pronouns. 
 37:08: I am a faculty member in the rhetoric and language department. 
 37:11: I'm teaching courses in public speaking and writing and new media. 
 37:15: this is my 3rd year at USF and also my 1st year as director of the Speaking Center. 
 37:20: Awesome, and welcome to the podcast episode. 
 37:23: so the ability to communicate effectively is such an important skill, whether it's for class presentations, discussions, or even everyday conversations. 
 37:32: Can you give us an overview of the mission behind the speaking center and what services you offer to help students improve their public speaking and communication skills? 
 37:42: Yeah, the speaking center is a campus resource, right? 
 37:46: We help students with public speaking projects and presentations, and we work with people at kind of any stage of a project, you know, a lot of the time people tend to think of public speaking as just like standing up and giving your speech, right? 
 37:58: But there's so much more that goes into it that's involved, obviously. 
 38:01: So, you know, whether you're. 
 38:02: out on a project and coming up with ideas or maybe you need help like integrating your research or organizing your main points or you'd like just another set of eyes on some visual aids you've created we can help with any of that and of course you know if you're ready to present but you just want practice, you wanna get some feedback and to hear someone else's perspective on what you have to say, of course we can do that too, right? 
 38:22: , most of the time students come to see us for help with, a speech that they're giving in class, but we've also worked with people who are preparing to present research at maybe an academic conference or as part of a thesis defense, or maybe they're giving a presentation at like a job or an internship, so any of those kind of public speaking projects or things we can do. 
 38:41: Yeah, fantastic, and public speaking can often be intimidating for many students and for international students in particular, there may be added challenges such as language barriers or cultural differences in communication styles or people are just, haven't done it before and hesitant to kind of be up there in front of like a class full of your colleagues or like you said at a professional conference. 
 39:07: So how does the speaking center support international students in developing that confidence and clarity in their speaking skills? 
 39:14: Yeah, I hear you. 
 39:16: I talk about this in my public speaking classes a lot, you know, public speaking is inherently a vulnerable act, because you're sharing an idea or a perspective with your audience, right? 
 39:24: Something that you believe in, something that you think is worth sharing. 
 39:27: I think statistically, something like 71% of people report being afraid of public speaking. 
 39:34: there are, yeah, absolutely additional challenges for international students or for multilingual students like you mentioned. 
 39:39: , so these are all things that the coaches who work in the speaking center understand, often from firsthand experience too. 
 39:46: you know, the coaches are all students. 
 39:49: They're undergraduate students, they're graduate level as well too. 
 39:52: So when you make an appointment to come to see us, you're sitting down in a one on one setting with the peer. 
 39:56: Right, which I think is really important. 
 39:59: it can be really helpful to talk with someone who is a little bit closer to where you are at. 
 40:03: they know what it's like to be a student right now, for example, or to have these particular anxieties or concerns about the way that you speak, or what you have to say. 
 40:13: , you know, some of them may have even taken like the same class or worked with the same instructor that you are working with. 
 40:18: so right now we have, 11 peer coaches, working in the speaking center, and, you know, several of them I've talked with who have talked about how public speaking is something that they've had to really work to improve at, learn to get comfortable with, and several of them are also international students too. 
 40:35: So, you know, if you're looking for someone who is going to be helpful and empathetic, to whatever challenges you have with public speaking, I promise there is absolutely someone on our staff you'll be able to work with. 
 40:47: and so for, for those one on one consultations, we hold 30 minute appointments, you can book those online through our website. 
 40:53: we mainly hold them in person in the basement of the Gleeson library, but we also started off. 
 40:58: Offering online appointments this semester too. 
 41:01: and then besides appointments, we also put on a few different events throughout the semester too. 
 41:08: some of these things are like workshops where the coaches will give short presentation on the topics like, the research process or connecting with your audience we'll do different like impromptu speaking activities, to help practice and get comfortable presenting in a low stakes environment. 
 41:20: , but we've also started hosting events designed to give students practice with, more like interperson interpersonal communication skills. 
 41:27: and I know that some of the international student coaches especially are working on developing events, specifically for international students, to work on like cross cultural communication and building community, among other multilingual speakers. 
 41:39: So we would love to see people at those events. 
 41:42: Yeah, it's great to hear that the students have such a diverse as well as tailored support system from the speaking center. 
 41:49: could you share some of the most maybe common concerns that the students bring, to the coaching sessions either to you or their peer coaches that you've heard of and how best maybe you can give like an advise or a tip that they can try and address those. 
 42:05: Yeah, I can think of a few things. 
 42:08: I think that most commonly people are coming to us when they're just feeling stuck or unsure of how to proceed with their projects. 
 42:14: you know, a lot of the time people might know what they want to say. 
 42:16: They just need help feeling more confident in their ideas or, maybe they want another person's perspective to make sure that what they're saying sounds right or makes sense, right? 
 42:24: , and even though we're the speaking center, you know, we definitely get appointments with people who want help with, writing their outlines or creating engaging visual aids as well, you know, for any of those things, you know, we take the time to sit down with the students, hear what are their goals for the project, or the needs of their audience as well too, thinking about who are you talking to, what do they know, what are they interested in, what are they concerned about, and so, so from there, but we can help people figure out what's going to be most important to say or to show your audience in the presentation. 
 42:53: , and then besides that, you know, speech anxiety, of course, is another common issue that we see, for better or worse, you know, the best advice I can give for anyone struggling with speech anxiety is just give yourself opportunities to practice public speaking in low stakes situations. 
 43:08: this is something that can help build up confidence to be successful when you have bigger speeches to give, like end of semester presentations or something for your job or whatever else like that. 
 43:16: , so I know that there's a few students who actually book regular appointments to come see us like every week or something like that, even if they don't have a specific project that they're working on. 
 43:25: so in those situations, the coaches might work with them on general skills, things like avoiding verbal failures in your speech maybe, or, storytelling. 
 43:35: And so, you know, these are students who recognize that putting in the time to practice just kind of one on one with their coach can help them to be ready for when they have a bigger project that comes their way, and I think it makes a big difference in their confidence. 
 43:45: , and then lastly, right, one other thing that I think international and multilingual students especially come to see us for help with is pronunciation, feeling confident in their English skills. 
 43:58: so I wanna, you know, make it clear, we're not here to correct your speech, we're not here to make you sound different, you know, the way you sound, the things that you have to say is important as it is, but, you know, several of our coaches are happy to just sit and practice conversational English, to give people more practice with it if that's what they need to, to feel more confident. 
 44:14: , I also give a quick shout out, my colleague Professor Tika Lamsal in rhetoric and language, he's the director of the Academic English for Multilingual students program, and one thing that that program does is they organize regular conversation hours kind of like this too, where multilingual students and also students whose first language is English, they can come together and practice conversation. 
 44:36: So, you know, that also sounds like something that, you know, the listeners would be interested in, feel free to send an email to the rhetoric and language department. 
 44:43: They can share more information. 
 44:45: Yeah, definitely, that's that's all of it. 
 44:47: Everything that you said is super helpful and thank you for sharing that resource with our listeners. 
 44:53: I think all of it kind of fosters the, you know, US community to bring everyone in instead of making more differences like pointing out how we speak and pronunciation and all of that. 
 45:05: So it's really important that the work that you and your colleagues do, especially here over at the speaking center. 
 45:11: And for students that might feel a little nervous about visiting the speaking center or making an appointment with you or the coaches, maybe they think that their speaking skills need to be perfect before coming in their pronunciation needs to be perfect and aligned with the American, English speech style. 
 45:31: What advice would you give them to encourage them to just like make an appointment and come in and meet with you? 
 45:36: Absolutely, yeah, come see us, you know, public speaking is a process, you know, any given project is a process like I talked about earlier, from the brainstorming to the research to outlining and all that, but public speaking just in general is also a lifelong skill that we develop and continue to improve that. 
 45:52: , you know, I've been doing public speaking off and on for, oh gosh, I don't never know how many years, but at least since I was in middle school, it's something I've done kind of throughout my academic career. 
 46:04: I teach it now, I'm still continuing to improve at it. 
 46:09: yeah, and the peer coaches, that work in the center, are all there because this. 
 46:12: Something that they enjoy helping other people to improve that as well too. 
 46:16: Like I said earlier, you know, many of them have been where you might be, maybe they're nervous about speaking up in front of other people or unsure of how their voice sounds. 
 46:25: they understand what it feels like and they can share strategies that have helped them to become more confident. 
 46:29: So I think that that kind of empathy is a big cornerstone of how we offer support. 
 46:33: Yeah, definitely. 
 46:35: And finally, before we let you go, what's the one thing that excites you most about the work that you do at the speaking center and what impact do you hope to see these services have out on our students here at USF and the USF international student community? 
 46:50: Hm. 
 46:51: You know, for me, I think public speaking is all about building a relationship between the speaker and the audience. 
 46:57: It's about being in community with each other and again sharing ideas that are are important to us. 
 47:03: the speaking center and again the American language department, my, my department, we're all about the Jesuit idea of eloquentia perfecta, which is communication for the common good. 
 47:13: , you know, I, I believe this really strongly. 
 47:15: Speech can bring us together. 
 47:16: It can help us to understand each other better, make decisions about how do we want to live together. 
 47:21: these things are incredibly important in a world that's increasingly connected, people moving from one place to another or, different means of communication, and so this is something that I think the speaking center really contributes to. 
 47:33: we're using public speaking in so many different aspects of our lives, like I talked about, you know, at work and our, our classes. 
 47:38: , but also, you know, not just traditional public speaking, but these days we see modes online like podcasting like this, or, video essays or things like that as well too. 
 47:49: So, you know, these are all forms of public speaking that we might be doing that contribute ideas to the world. 
 47:53: And so, you know, whatever it is, that you're doing, whatever kind of public speaking you're working on, you know, just know that the speaking center can help support you in finding your voice and sharing what you have to say with the world. 
 48:04: Yeah, definitely, definitely, I hear you and I hear your passion, the way you speak about the work that you do. 
 48:11: Thank you so much, Professor Chung. 
 48:13: It's been wonderful learning about the speaking center and the ways in which it helps students be more confident in their communication skills. 
 48:22: I appreciate your time and we look forward to connecting again soon. 
 48:28: And that's a wrap on this episode of Global Connections at USF. 
 48:32: We hope you found our conversation with the learning, writing and speaking centers insightful and inspiring. 
 48:38: So whether you need tutoring, writing support, or public speaking coaching, LWC how's your back? 
 48:43: Thanks for tuning in. 
 48:44: Until next time, keep learning, keep growing, and stay connected.