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Dean Paul Parsons of the School of Communications led a
session on program assessment at the inaugural World
Journalism Education Congress in Singapore, which attracted
more than 400 delegates from 45 nations from June 25-28,
2007.
Journalism administrators from around the world attended the
session featuring panelists from China, the United Arab
Emirates and the United States. The panelists described how
assessment -- the process of determining if students are
learning what we want them to learn -- has become a mandate
in the educational systems of many nations.
The World Journalism Education Congress was conceived by 29
journalism education organizations globally, ranging from
South Africa to India and from Israel to Denmark. Highlights
included the drafting and issuance of a Declaration of
Universal Journalism Principles, a preliminary report on a
global census under way on journalism education, and a model
journalism curriculum for developing nations issued by the
United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural
Organization (UNESCO).
Former CNN reporter Peter Arnett, now teaching in China, was
a keynote speaker, with research sessions focusing on digital
free speech and media coverage of war.
The Congress was held in conjunction with the 16th annual
conference of the Asian Media Information and Communication
Centre, which is housed at the Nanyang Technological
University in Singapore. Elon has a student exchange program
with the Singapore university.
"This was an exciting World Congress," Parsons
said. "We discovered that we have much more in common
than we thought. Freedom of expression is a byword for
journalism educators worldwide, and so is the need to provide
our students both intellectual foundations and journalistic
skills."
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