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From
the world’s leading business communication author, this quarterly
e-newsletter features valuable teaching supplements available
only to our subscribers. Click on the links above, below, or
to the left for case studies, teaching techniques, writing improvement
exercises, and articles on everything from cross-cultural communication
to news you can use and many other classroom topics of interest.
Dear Friends,
Fall is a special time of the year with the leaves changing color and Thanksgiving approaching. But it's also a special time for business communication educators who are able to attend the annual meeting of the Association for Business Communication.
 This year's annual meeting took place in Washington, and it was great to see so many new and old friends, such as Roxanne Bengelink, a first-time attendee from Kalamazoo Valley College, and Elizabeth Pierce, a veteran ABC member from Monroe Community College in New York.
This year's annual ABC conference was particularly exciting because we were within walking distance of Capitol Hill and all the national museums and gardens. The conference sessions were, as usual, stimulating and packed with excellent teaching ideas. One of the best sessions was "Teaching Professionalism," presented by Joyce Staples and Molly Blume of Bellevue Community College. Their terrific presentation gave the overflowing crowd advice, resources, and handouts.
Don Sampson, Radford University, discussed "grammar creep" in first-year composition textbooks. Although writing teachers for years have claimed that studying grammar does not improve writing, many textbooks are increasing grammar coverage. Hmmm, does this mean that composition authors are finally responding to the complaints of businesspeople that employees don't know grammar and can't write?
Both sessions of our first WebEx seminar, "Teaching With Guffey—It's Just That Easy," were well attended and gave me an opportunity to talk with many of you across this country and Canada. It's still amazing to me that we can use this new technology to connect instructors who are thousands of miles apart. I described many new features in Business Communication: Process and Product, 6e, that make it easy for teaching and learning. But I also answered questions from participants. If you want to join us for the next seminars, see the following schedule:
"Learning With Guffey—It's Just That Easy"
November 27 and November 30
"Aplia" and Guffey. It's Just That Easy"
February 5 and February 8
"Technology With Guffey. It's Just That Easy"
March 18 and March 21
You may sign up for the November seminar at www.swlearning.com/bcomm/guffey/lecture.
The sixth edition of Business Communication: Process and Product will be released December 28, 2007. One of my primary goals was to make this edition one that is easy from which to teach and learn. Here are some of the new features that ease the load of instructors:
- Prebuilt Course featuring complete syllabus and assignments
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New Comprehensive Instructor's Manual with lecture notes, discussion guides and solutions
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New Triple-Option PowerPoint Slides
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New Web Site for Students and Instructors
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New Custom Videos
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New activities, new transparency acetate package, new test banks, new references, and much more!
To order your review copy from South-Western/Cengage, call 1-800-423-0563, or talk to your sales rep.
We're busy building a new Web site, patterned on Martha Stewart's site, especially for Business Communication: Process and Product, 6e. Instructors with a Cengage password may see the site at http://www.meguffey.com. We have many more items to add to the site, but already you can see that it has a totally different look and easy navigation. Check it out!
If you ever need to convince someone of the worth of education, just cite these figures, from Elaine L. Chao, U.S. Secretary of Labor:
Worker Education |
Weekly Earnings |
Unemployment Rate |
| High school dropouts |
$522 |
7.1% |
| High school diploma |
$704 |
4.4% |
| Associate degree |
$846 |
3.5% |
| Bachelor's degree or higher |
$1,393 |
2.1% |
Source: Chao, E. L. (2007, Sept. 3). Knowledge fuels U.S. work force. Santa Barbara News-Press, p. A9.
Page view statistics show that nearly 90 percent of you who receive notice of this newsletter click through to see the newsletter. That's a fantastic "click-through" rate. Thanks for your exceptional support over the years! This issue of BizCom e-News offers a new case study, an exercise to review apostrophe use, tips for dispelling oral presentation myths, copyright information, a fellow instructor's favorite technique for using case studies in BC:PP, and news you can use in your teaching.
Sincerely,
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