Less prescription, more brainstorming: Teaching science and risk communication as a research class

Abstract

Risk, Disaster, and Humanitarian Communication is a required undergraduate course for Philippine Communication majors, but the standardized curriculum implies the need to create materials for a homogeneous audience assumed to be ignorant about and in need of scientific information. However, science and risk communication research show that communication must first be cognizant of local cultures by studying local understandings of science and risk. The author, moreover, belongs to a Jesuit university, which focuses on social justice and bridging cultural divides. The author, therefore, created a communication course based on insights from previous research, consistent with Ignatian pedagogy, and drawn from her own work in community understandings of risk. The course, COMM 24: Science and Risk Communication, requires students to discuss the natures of science, risk, and science communication. They then have to work with different science-based issues for a specific public: each time, they must propose research to explore the public's understanding of a specific risk, as well as a project grounded in empirical research. This structure provides students a holistic view of communication as an independent scholarly field with many questions yet to be explored, and one that must inform practice, rather than simply act as handmaiden to any other field.