Designed to build professional competencies, this task sees students plan to curate a hypothetical professional event relevant to their discipline. For example, in MSTU2006 students create a season of Australian films for a Cinematheque program. Students produce program notes (1000 words) that can be split over multiple entries. As this task requires students to adopt various professional, historical and cultural perspectives, programming notes should speak to the various sociocultural and historical settings with which the event engages. A 500 word rationale should accompany these notes and integrate insights from (1) consultations with the course convenor; and (2) relevant scholarly or disciplinary databases. Programming notes can be presented using Cirrus, an online exhibition platform. In the case of MSTU2006, this assessment is designed to provide students with an in-depth knowledge of Australian cinema history, but it also teaches students how to write for a public audience, conduct archival research in digital contexts, and teaches multimedia digital design skills and online exhibition competencies.
Details
- CLASS SIZE
- 40-60
- CLASS LEVEL
- Second year
- ASSESSMENT SECURITY
- Medium security
- TIME REQUIREMENTS
- Medium time
- CONDITIONS
- Sequence
- FEATURES
- Authentic
- TAGS
- multimodal
Advantages
Completed assessment may become part of student's professional portfolios, thus enhancing potential employability. This assessment could be usefully transferred to Drama, Art History, Museum Studies, or any other discipline that has need for using online exhibition platforms and large online databases. Encourages the creative application of disciplinary knowledge for broadcast to a wider audience, making this technique highly useful for interdisciplinary contexts and heterogeneous cohorts (e.g. elective courses)
Challenges
Some students may need guidance selecting an event relevant to their discipline. This is easily provided by dedicating class time to developing a working list of potential events from which students can choose.
Tips for implementation
Encourage students to select and commit to an event/program choice early in semester and work through potential challenges as they arise. Equally, staff should discourage a constant changing of events/topics so as to minimise potential time lost.
How it supports academic integrity
When writing their program notes, students have to address the content in relation to an individually negotiated rationale for the hypothetical event (based on consultations with their course convener). The specificity and process of negotiation act as deterrents to academic misconduct.
Professor Tom O’Regan was a pioneering scholar and much-loved colleague, who sadly passed away on 17 July 2020.
He was a key figure in the development of cultural and media studies in Australia and had an international reputation for his work in screen policy studies. His research publications reflect his abiding interest in the production studies of film, television, and new media; audience measurement of broadcasting; and cultural institutions.
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