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Scholar of the Month
Jessica Barness
Assistant Professor of Visual Communication Design
College of Communication and Information
2012-present

The word “communication” likely makes you think of language, but November’s Scholar of the Month has spent her entire career researching design as a language of its own.

Across various media, Jessica Barness, an assistant professor in ����ֱ�� State University’s School of Visual Communication Design, creates her own design-based research model that merges the making of artifacts with critical inquiry.

“I’m interested in the multiple facets of design,” she said. “Design is social, and it’s a professional practice as well as a scholarly discipline. We’re designing artifacts and experiences, but we’re also building the new knowledge necessary to inform and lead those activities. Research through design can be used to better understand people, phenomena, theories or technologies. By approaching design as a sort of hybrid practice, our students learn how to adapt to future needs within our society.

READ MORE ABOUT JESSICA

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����ֱ�� State University global communication studies graduate student Daniel Socha’s research on a non-profit organization’s efforts to support youth education in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) recently caught the attention of National Public Radio (NPR). In May, Socha traveled to the DRC to study and report on Project Kirotshe, a non-profit that provides funding for youth in the village of Kirotshe and surrounding areas to attend school.

Socha’s travel was funded through a fellowship by the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting. He was one of only 31 students nationwide to receive a fellowship to complete an international reporting assignment; the center provides funding for students to report on international issues as part of the center’s Campus Consortium educational initiative. One of the stories Socha developed for his reporting assignment was published on .

“It was awesome to see my article on NPR’s website,” Socha said. “To see my words and to know that I did that – I wrote that – was amazing.”