Welcome to Episode 30, everyone! I love these nice, round numbers. And we're ten episodes past the traditional dying-off point of most podcasts, so I'm both excited about that and really appreciative to all the folks that've helped me make this thing, those that've agreed to be on it, and especially you, the listener. 

In this episode we're doing something a little bit different. Instead of me rambling on about some particular topic and instead of me interviewing someone, we're going to turn the tables a bit. Back in July I was asked by the Office of Digital Learning to speak to a group of faculty and staff about doing precisely what I'm doing right now: that is, podcasting. Whether it was faculty that wanted to podcast to get content to students or staff that wanted to learn how to support faculty and students in that venture, we had a nice little group of folks in the Harvill studio that some of my interview episodes have been recorded in. 

It's a bit short at about 15 minutes and clearly it was before the most recent season as I even say in the interview that I don't ... do interviews. But that's a great illustration of how you should allow yourself and what you create to change when you feel the need.

I do apologize for the audio quality on my end of the conversation. Either the microphone wasn't positioned properly or there was some other sort of problem. It's understandable ... just not great. I'm pretty sure it's my fault ... and I'm happy to say my mic technique has improved considerably since then.

So, here's me getting interviewed by the wonderful Janet Smith at ODL, whom I'm planning on getting on the pod in the new year. This is likely the last episode of 2018 unless I feel the undeniable urge to do a holiday episode but... don't hold your breath. It's also the (probably) last episode of season three! So, check back in spring semester of 2019 for season FOUR. Can you believe it? Anyway, enjoy.

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So thank you for being here today. Everyone, and I'm here with Ryan straight, who is a professor here at the University of Arizona and Ryan has been podcasting, for how long now.

About a year and and what is the what is the name of your podcast, the new

The new professor. So tell me a little bit about that name what that means to you and what was sort of your, you know, personal and professional motivation for beginning the new professor. Well, honestly, it came about because I listened to a podcast walk the dogs can

Do that.

And

I'm still pretty new at this, but I also was trying to

Figure out a way to kind of

Surgery myself in

The Academy and in my field and just in a new

A new position I finished my PhD in 2015 and I just had

A full time position, same time and

Just

Feel better

Yet

Other people in the same situation. Yeah, whether they're new or they just always felt like that, whatever the case may be, but

I thought I find a way to work through this and kind of

Figure it out myself but

Would other from that as well.

Maybe to know that somebody else somebody else. Oh, I

Didn't say that

So the audience for your podcast is other professors other instructors.

TV. Okay, and what did it sort of morph into as you began to create

Into me count rambling but I found interesting.

instructors do that sort of thing.

Yeah, I mean, it was

It sort of episodes of how to deal with colleagues.

For example,

Change episode on last summer. It was really hot.

Rods.

One day,

To write about. I saw some white dog and like the

little dots.

That's cool.

So I did an entire episode about he throws exception realty proceeded just kind of ran with it. So it was that

Faculty

But I did that for maybe a dozen episodes I was doing one a week. And initially, I thought, Oh, I can do like an hour week. It doesn't talk. I just sit there and talk and whatnot to

Fix that turned into spirited very produce yeah 20 minute episodes. And so what those 20 minute episodes. How long did that take you to create it. Would you say, including the scripting and the recording and clean up the whole deal.

About

That. So I was with Wednesday's Wednesday's Wednesday's and I get up in the morning to get ready for work and I sit there with my laptop and start scraping start finding resources and references and

Figuring out what we use it to us.

Goes to work with the dogs. I go walk in closet with my laptop.

Which takes

So that's that tells us a little bit about why you sort of. Personally, professionally got into it. Talk to us a little bit about how you use it in your courses with students, right. So, initially I did not plan on

Any wish it was doing a pocket. It's just a passion project or something fun that I wanted to do, because sometimes you teach it is all these

Kind of a tangent that your mind goes on. And one of the ways to share those with behave in a way that I also felt like I was teaching. That's, that's how that came about, but then

When I was

Picked to the Faculty Fellow over the the south campus.

I was had figured out a way to do that and just so happened that the podcasts that kind of popped in my head, maybe this is a good venue for that because, like, they're not going to come to me because it's everything's online.

And everybody's different places. But if I can go to them if I can do it in this way, doesn't matter where they are.

They give you a row that can be main campus. They can do south, they can be Dallas to these are where they are.

Right and make that connection.

And then revamping classes and this was right about the time that we started really trying to piggyback corporate

Data and incorporated the creative campus, the Adobe products, trying to get students into that and use that. So I thought, okay, well, I need to figure out

How to get these creative

Creative Cloud apps into the classes and the podcast. Make it a project. So whatever the topic of the courses. There's a product issue podcast theme.

Generally speaking, and then I basically teach them how to use the software some best practices and skills. Give them some examples. And then they run with it. I've had everything from how to raise cheese.

Rain cycle. I would just anything you can possibly because I didn't look at the graduate level any undergraduate level so different, different target audiences different checker topics.

The students really do is just

Do one thing for

Us, really. Yeah, I love it.

So as we were talking about, you know, in our previous meeting, we've been talking about your podcast and how you got started. And one of the things that you said that I thought was

Two things actually that I thought were really interesting and I'd like you to only to just those two that I wanted you to elaborate on the first one was, you said

And these were not recorded lectures. So that was not the, the way that you were using podcasts in your classroom and you said podcasts are not lectures and lectures are not podcasts.

So can you talk a little bit about what you feel like the strength of the podcast is and why it is different from say coming into the studio and recording your lecture on video or producing electron some, you know, a voiceover PowerPoint, that sort of thing.

That you said every day reveals the most visual medium.

Yet

There is something about and I guess I should preface this by saying that I call what I do podcast.

Sad object.

Podcast interviews. There's no news of the week.

But

It doesn't lecture, for example, feels like you're talking to.

You are talking to

A group of people that whether the lecture is purely one sided or its interactive, whatever the case may be. It's still you to this one.

And when you're doing a podcast. It feels like

Because it's you and the listeners. Now you have to listen first. It's just you're talking to one person. That's how I imagine

Holding the the

Thing for the pantyhose color thing.

On that and sitting there holding the script on

That's what imagine. Imagine you are speaking to an individual person and that there's something about having that in your head when you're doing it really comes across in the medium itself to produce

It's

It's not simply to

The last out content.

To the lectures at least typically that's

Giving content to the students. They need this, I am giving this to that which is another conversation together. Good, bad

But

Doing something like podcast is telling a story. It is a narrative.

Weaving throughout this. This time you're speaking to one person in particular.

And once you get your head around it. It ceases to be

Work and it becomes

Play. Yeah, it becomes a creative adventure. Yeah, as opposed to solving required. Yeah.

Yeah, so the one of the other things you said was that you felt like for you, especially because with teaching online. There can be that piece of

I missed the face to face feeling right of talking, even if you're lecturing, you're, you're up at the front, but you can

Read the body language, you can make eye contact with your students and you feel like you are connected with them and that can be

Lost in online. And a lot of times when initially folks trance transfer over from face to face teaching to online that's

Almost always what they tell you know the instructional designers that, how do I feel like I'm still connecting with my students and

You said to me that this was a way of returning teaching to the teacher and I love that. And I wanted you to talk a little bit about how do you feel like this returns teaching to you and to your students for me.

isn't really that much of an issue.

Mostly because I teach. I teach my class here for ours but in my program that I teach

Whatever so

And

By their nature require meetings. You don't have to just have to be a single place.

I do that then way I have I have required

virtual meetings use Adobe economics.

And I have any way that I can require it, but still be an option, but that's the first thing. But

A lot of online courses are very hands off in terms of tissue.

And even students to

Top of friends.

If that is the case, and I've been given classes to teach where there was virtually no interaction between the teacher and students. It was very good also, of course,

Get very common, which is not great.

If you are required to do that. If that's the course of course to teach you can support that theory by doing something like this and it gives you that option to talk to

To to engage them away with maybe it's just simply content, maybe it's something select

Something

Interesting. That's just related or maybe it's

Just one template. So here's something that you make is somebody added a discussion.

I think is a very powerful thing when you lack that connection.

Yeah, and I understand.

It or actually this podcast. If you want something one way. Right.

Yeah, it's, it was thinking of your do your quarterly thinking that has a dialogue with someone and you're just waiting for them afterwards for their turn to to come back. It changes. But again, that goes back to August. Right. It's not just shock on the last day of content.

Right, it's just the beginning of the conversation right it's meant to be that that narrative piece that you mentioned that storytelling.

Don't know where my students to listen to my podcast.

Yeah because invariably students will come back to continue the conversation started with that. Yeah, completely separate class.

Which indices in the house. Yeah, very rewarding. Well, thank you very much for your time today, Ryan. We really appreciate you coming and sharing your experience with us.