School of Communication

School of Communication University of Miami

Galapagos Summer Summer I, 2016

STC 493-01/629-01 The Galapagos Islands: Social Media and Global Strategic Communication May 9-31, 2016 3 credits This course is part of the comprehensive 6-credit Galapagos Summer program

Setting: On location for three weeks in the Galapagos Islands and on the mainland of Ecuador with field trips en route at the Panama Canal in Panama City, Panama, and in Guayaquil, Ecuador.

Professor: Heidi Carr Office: 3001 Wolfson Office Hours: By appointment all day, most days in Miami; 24 hours a day in the Galapagos Telephone: 305-877-1627 Email: [email protected]

COURSE DESCRIPTION AND PURPOSE:

This is a three-credit course learning and implementing social media and strategic communication using the environment and culture of the Galapagos Islands as our subject material. Throughout the three weeks, the students will create a plan and develop a social media strategy to promote the Galapagos experience. The most recent statistics show that while two-thirds of all men and three-fourths of all women use the social media platform Facebook, those numbers drop significantly to less than one-quarter of all men and one-fifth of all women who use Twitter. Other forms of social media are even less utilized. And yet, it is universally accepted that all forms of business see social media as a means of self-promotion. This course will teach the participants the strengths and weaknesses of each platform, the responsibilities involved with social media, the best forms of content and the steps in creating and implementing the strategy. The course will be led by Professor Heidi Carr, who teaches public relations courses in the School of Communication. The students will complete the work for this course while simultaneously taking part in another 3-credit course, “The Galapagos Islands: Environment and Culture, Writing, Research, Critical Thinking.” This course will be taught by Professor Joseph B. Treaster, a long-time foreign correspondent and reporter for The New York Times. Each 3-credit course will have its own requirements and assignments. The six-credit program, Galapagos Summer, provides hands-on experiential learning and is designed to benefit students across a wide range of disciplines. The program immerses students in all majors in the beauty of the Galapagos and guides them in individually developed programs that sharpen communication capabilities needed in all careers. Part of the experiential learning is a community service project. The learning in the Galapagos is fun. Students swim with sea lions and marine iguanas, get within inches of giant Galapagos tortoises and nesting blue- footed boobies, climb volcanos and explore isolated beaches and kayak in tranquil lagoons. They talk with fishermen as they bring in their catches of tuna and wahoo, have meals in beachfront mom and pop restaurants and sometimes sing along with little pickup groups of Galapagos musicians with guitars and drums. It is all part of the research, all part of the learning.

COURSE OBJECTIVES: o Branch out from the familiar social media platforms and learn how to use new ones, such as Periscope, Videolicious and Splice. o To learn how to target an audience based on demographics and psychographics. o Enhance understanding of the synergies between words, photographs, video and sound in the digital age o Develop an understanding of the culture and environment of Ecuador and the Galapagos Islands and of how they relate to the rest of the world o Sharpen communication skills, which will prove invaluable no matter the chosen career path.

COURSE PREREQUISITES: This course is open to all undergraduate and graduate students in all majors by permission of the instructor with approval of the Office of Study Abroad. ATTENDANCE POLICY: Attendance is mandatory. Only illness is a reason to fail to participate in classes, field trips and other events. Other absences will result in a reduction of two points each on the final course grade. Late arrivals and early departures will result in a reduction of one point on the final grade. There is no make-up of missed classes or of missed work. All work must be completed in the Galapagos.

REQUIRED TEXT: Marsh*Guth*Short, Strategic Writing: Multimedia Writing, third edition

RECOMMENDED: The Associated Press Stylebook, 2015, Guidelines for Social Media Use.

ASSIGNMENTS AND COURSE WORK:

Students will be exposed to dozens of new social media platforms. From there, they will winnow it down to three that they want to use throughout the program. They will begin by studying demographics and psychographics to determine which platforms suits their purpose. They will learn how to use these new platforms. Throughout the trip, they will constantly be utilizing their skills, using the beauty of the Galapagos as their subject matter, to create a body of work.

In addition, the students will create a blog and contribute to it daily. The blog will include photos, their impressions of the Galapagos, and interesting facts they believe readers would be interested in learning.

The class will create a Social Media calendar, with each participating student taking two days when he/she manages all the platforms. The leader that day will have to collect input from the other students and then load it up for public viewing.

GRADING AND EVALUATION: This course is for graduate and undergraduate students. Graduate students carry a heavier work load. Undergraduates are encouraged to work toward the higher standard. Grading follows the standard practice at the University of Miami. Here are the quantitative and qualitative scales: A+ 97-100, A 93-96, A- 90-92, B+87-89, B 84-86, B- 80-83, C+ 77-79, C 74-76, C- 70-73, D+ 67-69, D 64-66, D- 60-63, F 59 and below A = Superior Attainment, B = Above Average, C = Average, D = Below Average, E = Unacceptable/failure How Grades Will Be Calculated: Graduate Students* Field Trips, participation 10 percent Management of the social media platforms 10 percent Daily contributions to the social media platforms 20 percent Daily blog 20 percent Social Media Capstone* 40 percent Undergraduate Students Field Trips, participation 10 percent Management of the social media platforms 10 percent Daily contributions to the social media platforms 20 percent Daily blog 20 percent Social Media Capstone 40 percent

*Additional Work for Graduate Students Graduate students are required to use one additional social media platform. The project will be developed in consultation with the faculty. HONOR CODE AND PLAGIARISM STATEMENT: Students enrolled in this course are expected to abide by the University of Miami Honor Code. The purpose of the Honor Code is to protect the academic integrity of the University by encouraging consistent ethical behavior in assigned coursework. Academic dishonesty of any kind will not be tolerated. No student wants to be guilty of the intellectual crime of plagiarism, even unintentionally. Therefore, we provide you with these guidelines so that you don't accidentally fall into the plagiarism trap. Plagiarism is the taking of someone else's words, work, or ideas, and passing them off as a product of your own efforts. Plagiarism may occur when a person fails to place quotation marks around someone else's exact words, directly rephrasing or paraphrasing someone else's words while still following the general form of the original, and/or failing to issue the proper citation to one’s source material. In student work, plagiarism is often due to:  Turning in someone else's paper as one’s own  Using another person’s data or ideas without acknowledgment  Failing to cite a written source (printed or Internet) of information that you used to collect data or ideas  Copying an author’s exact words and putting them in the paper without quotation marks  Rephrasing an author’s words and failing to cite the source  Copying, rephrasing, or quoting an author’s exact words and citing a source other than where the material was obtained. (For example, using a secondary source that cites the original material, but citing only the primary material. This misrepresents the nature of the scholarship involved in creating the paper. If you have not read an original publication, do not cite it in your references as if you have.  Using wording that is very similar to that of the original source, but passing it off as one’s own.  The last item is probably the most common problem in student writing. It is still plagiarism if the student uses an author’s key phrases or sentences in a way that implies they are his/her own, even if s/he cites the source.

COURSE OUTLINE: This schedule may change to make the most of opportunities that arise. Students accepted into the program are required to participate in three orientation briefings and discussions in March and April 2016.

Galapagos Experience: Day 1 - May 9, Monday - Depart Miami for Galapagos Islands via Panama and Guayaquil, Ecuador. Arrive at Miami International Airport two hours before scheduled departure to Panama City, Panama. Focus: The Panama Canal. Students will shoot video, take photos and summarize the highlights for posting. Day 2 - May 10, Tuesday - Leave Panama, early morning flight to Guayaquil. Arrive Guayaquil mid-day. Students will explore Guayaquil’s historic Cathedral, study the land iguanas in the city’s central park and tour the lush botanical garden. They will be shooting video, taking photos and notes and creating assorted social media projects, such as “BuzzFeed” style Top 10 list, or video that will make the viewer feel he is feeding the iguanas with us. Day 3 - May 11, Wednesday - Leave Guayaquil early morning for the Galapagos Islands. Arrive at the main airport in the Galapagos on Baltra Island late morning. Washington Paredes, a senior National Parks guide and the vice mayor of the town of Puerto Ayora, meets us at the Baltra ferry landing with a bus that takes us to the Hotel Castro in Puerto Ayora, the main town on the island of Santa Cruz. The students will have lunch with a member of the Galapagos Conservancy, get a walking tour of the town and end up at the Charles Darwin Research Center. This will be the first time the students will see Giant Tortoises and sea lions close up and personal. They will be blogging about this experience, as well as taking photos and video. Day 4 - May 12, Thursday – Class will hike to Tortuga Bay, seeing along the way sea birds, sea turtles, sea lions and white tipped sharks. Guide Washington Paredes will demonstrate bird calls and talk about the impact of ocean erosion. Students will have the afternoon free to swim and kayak in the lagoon before hiking the one-hour trail back to town. Along the way, students will be collecting photos and facts for their social media projects. Day 5 – May 13, Friday – After a morning lecture on what makes the best content for social media, students will be free throughout the day to gather information for both of their projects. The students will be out in the field, under the supervision of both professors, who will be guiding them on collecting information and visuals. Day 6 – May 14, Saturday – After a brief morning lecture, students will meet individually with professors for updates and feedback. Students will have some time to go out in the field to conduct interviews for the JMM portion of the program. In the afternoon, the students will take a boat to a mangrove area. We will hike through the swamp to Las Griatas, a natural spring. Along the way, students will see sea birds, tropical plants and trees, and likely a blue-footed boobie. Students will be posting photos and writings on social media live from the location. Day 7 – May 15, Sunday – The class will travel by bus to the highlands of Santa Cruz, where we will go to a land tortoise farm, walk through a volcanic cave, and hike to one of the highest spots in the Galapagos for lunch. Students will be gathering photos and information for their social media platforms. Day 8 - May 16, Monday – Following a morning lecture, the class will go out into the field to gather information for their projects. Throughout the day, the professors will be having one-on- one meetings to go over their progress so far. Day 9 – May 17, Tuesday – Field trip by island cruiser to Bartolome Island for a study of the geology of the islands, snorkeling with sea lions and schools of fish. On the way see blue-footed boobies and frigate birds contesting for food at the island of Daphne Major, one of their nesting places. Students will use their cameras underwater to take photographs and shoot video to be posted on several social media platforms. Day 10 – May 18, Wednesday – Individual meetings with professors to review work and blog progress. Day 11 – May 19, Thursday – Field trip by island cruiser to North Seymour Island and Bachas Beach with guide Washington Paredes. Lunch on the boat. Concentrations of blue-footed boobies and frigate birds on North Seymour; flamingos and marine iguana colonies at Bachas Beach. Swim with sea lions. Students will be collecting photos and information for social media. Day 12 – May 20, Friday – Individual meetings with professors to review collection of social media work and blog progress. During this meeting, students may be urged to learn a new social media outlet to add to their repertoire. Day 13 – May 21, Saturday – Class leaves Santa Cruz for San Cristobal Island. Along the way, we stop at Santa Fe Island where we will see large numbers of sea lions and sea turtles. We will stop near a waterfall and swim with manta rays. Arrive on San Cristobal. We will have a short orientation and end up on the nearby beach at sunset. Students will file their blog items and social media for the day. Day 14 - May 22, Sunday – Class will hike through a natural preserve called Cerro Las Tijeretas (Frigate Bird Hill). After an hour, we will end up at Darwin Bay, the cliff-protected cove where Charles Darwin first landed in the Galapagos Islands in 1835 aboard the sailing ship, the HMS Beagle. There, we will swim in the crystalline waters with sea lions and turtles. We will take selfies with the towering statue of Darwin that overlooks the bay. Afterward, we will stop at the Galapagos Interpretation Center where a guide will teach us about the history of the area. Throughout the hike and swim, students will be taking photos and video which they will be posting onto various social media platforms. We will wind up at Playa Mann at sunset.

Day 15 - May 23, Monday – Half the students will have individual meetings with professor to review their social media body of work. Day 16 – May 24, Tuesday - Remaining half of the students will have individual meetings professor to review their social media body of work. Day 17 – May 25 – Wednesday – Continued update on blog and other social media platforms. Day 18 – May 26, Thursday – Field trip, hike to Junco Lake, a fresh water lake at 2,100 feet in the highlands of San Cristobal, with national parks guide. Briefing at La Galapaquera, land tortoise conservation center. Lunch at country-style restaurant. Afternoon at Puerto China Beach and Playa Brava, sea lions, sea birds, volcanic rock, observation of ocean currents and beach structure. Students will continue to gather information and publish it on daily blog and social media platforms. Day 19 - May 27- Friday – Review of student’s entire body of social media work created throughout the three-week period. Student will compare their original social media plan and the final result. Student and professor will jointly discuss the evolution of the social media project and how it would be implemented in the business world. Day 20 – May 28, Saturday – Students may have the time if they need for putting final touches on social media project. Those who are finished will be rewarded with a final field trip adventure, most likely a day at a beach on another side of the island or snorkeling around Kicker Rock, a natural formation that was used by soldiers training during World War II for target practice

Day 21– May 29, Sunday – Observation of sea lion colonies displaced by new airport, note relationships between mothers, cubs and bull sea lions and the sounds and movements they use to communicate. Updates to blog and other social media.

Day 22 – May 30, Monday - Hike to tropical bird and sea lion sanctuary at Playa de Lobos. Include this in final blog posts and social media. Farewell sunset at Playa Mann. Day 23 – May 31, Tuesday - Fly to Miami via Guayaquil and Panama. Arrive Miami shortly after midnight.

This course emphasizes applied skills and the production and publication of news stories and creative work– both in terms of text and multimedia. What we produce in this class, as submitted by you or as later edited and modified, may be published and displayed by the University. Therefore, we require your consent to such uses of the material you produce individually or as part of a team effort as well as your consent to use your name and likeness. Unless you are working on a special project that requires an assignment of ownership rights and you agree to that assignment, you own your work, as far as the University is concerned. You may use your work for your portfolio and your purposes. If you have any questions about the consent form below, please let your professor know. Thank you.

Tear off and return with information required below:

STUDENT ACKNOWLEDGEMENT AND CONSENT:

I AGREE AND UNDERSTAND THAT IMAGES (E.G., PHOTOGRAPHS AND VIDEO) OF MY LIKENESS, RECORDINGS OF MY VOICE AND STORIES I HAVE WRITTEN OR HELPED PRODUCE, SHOOT OR EDIT, MAY APPEAR IN WEBSITES, VARIOUS PUBLICATIONS, OTHER MEDIA AND IN RELATED MATERIALS PRODUCED OR PUBLISHED BY THE UNIVERSITY OF MIAMI, SCHOOL OF COMMUNICATION AND/OR ANY OF ITS EMPLOYEES, AGENTS, LICENSEES OR CONTRACTORS (COLLECTIVELY, “UM”). MY SIGNATURE BELOW GRANTS THE FOLLOWING RIGHTS TO UM: THE RIGHT TO USE AND RE-USE, LICENSE, PUBLISH AND REPUBLISH, MODIFY, EXHIBIT, TRANSMIT, OBTAIN, AND MAKE DERIVATIVE USES OF ANY STORIES, ARTICLES, PHOTOGRAPHS, BROADCASTS, FILMS, VIDEOTAPES, IMAGES OR RECORDINGS (“WORKS”) OF ME OR MADE OR CREATED BY ME, IN WHOLE OR IN PART, OR IN WHICH I MAY HAVE PARTICIPATED AS A STUDENT IN (CLASS NUMBER). I AGREE THAT THESE WORKS MAY BE USED FOR EDITORIAL, PROMOTIONAL, TRADE, ADVERTISING, COMMERCIAL, EDUCATIONAL AND ANY OTHER LAWFUL PURPOSE IN ANY MEDIUM NOW EXISTING OR SUBSEQUENTLY DEVELOPED. MY AGREEMENT IS A GRANT OF WORLDWIDE RIGHTS IN PERPETUITY. SIGNED: ______

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I HAVE RECEIVED AND READ THE SYLLABUS FOR STC 493-01/629-01The Galapagos Islands: Social Media and Global Strategic Communication 2016

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