Below is a transcript of our conversation with Lesley Withers, Executive Director of CMU’s Presentation Skills Center
David Nicholas:
I'm David Nicholas, and this is Central Focus, a weekly look at research activity and innovative work from Central Michigan University students and faculty. Most universities have writing and math centers offering extra help for students. CMU also has a center designed to offer help in public speaking. It began in 2017, suspended due to COVID, and now in its reboot, it has earned national certification. Joining me with the whole story was Lesley Withers, Executive Director of CMU's Presentation Skills Center, or PSC.
Lesley Withers:
One of the most exciting things that we offer right now is the ability for students and clients to use virtual reality headsets to practice their presentations in front of a virtual audience. And the program that we use is called Virtual Speech. It's powered by ChatGPT technology. So, there's artificial intelligence behind the actual audience members, the virtual audience members for these speeches, so that when you give a presentation to this virtual audience, they can actually ask relevant follow-up questions to the material that you just presented. It's really cool!
DN:
The National Association of Communication Centers, or the NACC, now has recognized the efforts. How did you take the restart, the 2.0, as you said, and then bring that to the national attention that's now bringing with it the national certification?
LW:
Well, the National Association of Communication Centers offers this certification process to ensure the highest levels of integrity and training in preparing our peer tutors. So, the Presentation Skills Center, kind of like CMU's Writing Center, has peer tutors or peer consultants that work one-on-one with clients. And that breaks down some of the barriers between clients and the person who's giving advice because they feel more comfortable being vulnerable and saying, I need help. And so, it's that peer tutor training process that is evaluated by the NACC to make sure that it is a comprehensive and highly rigorous program. And we were happily, we were certified. So, we applied for certification once we had enough years of documentation of that training process that we could apply. And they selected us for certification. So, we're excited.
DN:
Yeah, is that a, then every two years, five years, sometimes to keep things current, relevant, up to date, when might you be going through that process again?
LW:
I'm not sure that we will have to repeat the process, although I think they do like to see updates in terms of the assessment data that we're collecting to make sure that we are continuing to uphold those same high standards. But this makes us one of only 21 certified centers in the nation and one of only two here in Michigan.
DN:
Some good, rarefied air!
LW:
Yeah.
DN:
And to that end, in looking at peer groups outside of CMU, are there other centers that you have looked at as a model? And the flip side of that, are others looking now to CMU to say, so that everybody's trying to obviously continue to upgrade and improve?
LW:
Absolutely. So that's really the purpose of the National Association of Communication Centers. They hold a conference every spring, and we've been lucky enough to attend either virtually or in person. And that conference is hosted by a campus that has a communication center, and they offer to host. So, one of the great opportunities is to go to a campus that has a successful center and learn from what they're doing, see their space, talk with their consultants and figure out, so how are they doing things and get new ideas for how we can improve and streamline our own processes and training procedures.
DN:
Congratulations on the national certification. And as you noted, one of just 20 in the nation and one of only two here in Michigan, the Presentation Skills Center. earning its place in helping prepare our students for life beyond the college experience. Leslie Withers, thank you very much for sharing the story and all the best as the efforts continue.
LW:
Thank you so much!
