BRETT HAMME
WHAT IS COMMUNICATION STUDIES???
My Story
Throughout my years as a Communication Studies major, I have grown professionally and personally based on the things I have learned strictly within the College of Communication and Information Sciences at The University of Alabama. Communication Studies is a major that builds better people through teaching the value of communication. Communication is the key to learning new things, expressing one's self, leading, and becoming succesful at whatever it may be. Through this major I have become not only a better reader and writer, but a better speaker, a better empathizer, and better listener. It has taught me how to communicate across cultural barriers, as well as emotional ones. Communication Studies helped show me the value in researching new things, asking questions that affect all people, and then being able to in turn take this information and explain it in ways everyone can understand. By teaching students how communication works at individual levels, professors within this major help graduates become efficient in communication as a whole, whether it is communicating to clients for a business, the public for a large entity, or an individual seeking help in a friend. This major, more than anything taught me how to intake any kind of information, figure out a way to process it, and then to then spread it in an understandable and meaningful way. This is an invaluable skill to have in any profession and will also help lead my life in ways I never considered before attending this college.
LEARNING OUTCOMES
Communicate, reflect, and engage in a diverse society.
Beyond my stay at The University of Alabama, a diverse society in its own, I have become proficient in being aware of other cultures, standpoints, and personal positions in ways that have made me a better communicator as a whole. I worked for three of my four years in university at Super 8 Hotel in Tuscaloosa, a town with a huge influx of people visiting or traveling through during football season. Along with working alongside with many coworkers who were not born in the United States, much less the deep south, I have been able to engage with people as a front desk employee from across the globe. I have been able to make numerous connections with guests that I serviced, and more so be successful in communicating effectively with all types of people. ​
Digest complex messages, analyze fast-moving information flows, and craft effective responses that increase your influence.
Through much of the work done in my Communication Studies classes I have been able to properly show that I can take information not easily comprehendable and in return create a meaningful response through what I took in, but it does not stop there. This major, by building my ability to intake complex and fast moving information, has made me more aware of the world around me, built my interests of many things, and increased my ability to articulate what I learn to others. After completing my studies, I have become much more well rounded in my knowledge of current events, political happenings, and societal change moreso than I ever was.​
Develop and maintain healthy professional and personal relationships.
Having a job since I was 16, I have always valued building my professional relationships in order to increase my ceiling, as well as learn more about what I wanted to do with my life. Because of this, as well as the professional skills I learned within my major I have been steadily employeed all throughout college, maintaining relationships with previous internship superiors and previous co-workers of mine. This has helped me find opporunities that I may have never been exposed to before. As far as personal relationships, Communication Studies has helped me become a better friend, a better family member, and a better associate by learning how to listen, take perspective, and be able to communicate with these people in ways they can understand and be receptive to. ​
Engage in civic life and organizations as leaders and effective team members.
Communication Studies has helped me become a better leader and team member, as well as a better citizen. During my time in school, I voted in my first presidential election, voted in my first state elections, and helped spread information via word-of-mouth and social media about my choice of candidate who then went on to become​ the first democrat elected to the senate in my state in 25 years. Along with that, I have honed my leadership skills through my marketing intership, where I was promoted to Team Leader within Tuscaloosa for the company, and was able to help increase my companies noteriety, as well as build an effective team that engaged with the community of Tuscaloosa.
Understand and apply communication theories and scholarship to relevant contexts in your life.
As far as applying communication theory to my life outside of the classroom, ithas become an unconcious, yet driving force in many things I do. By considering my own perspective and lens in which I behave compared to others, as well as how I am communicated to, I can have more productive and insightful communication between those I interact with. To give an example, I try and recognize that although I am my own person with an agenda of my own and own personal biases, through a Social Learning Theory lens, I have learned many of my behaviors and opinions from others, which gives a chance for great reflection on most thoughts and feelings I have on a number of things.