Counting the difference

E-mail is not all talk. Today it was numbers.

I gave my students in my Strategic Communications Research class a second version of a survey Tammy McNiel devised to measure attitude toward e-mail. The same students took the original survey last week. I gave them another version this week -- after five days of no e-mail contact from me -- to see if their attitudes changed at all.

The new version also had a few specific questions about my e-mail, plus questions about the use of Instant Messaging.

I am very seriously considering the elimination of virtual office hours. I know some students love them, but I also realize they extend my work day. Perhaps I could limit them to one evening a week and also keep AIM open during certain daytime hours.

Yesterday Larry Powell talked to me about how dependent he has become on e-mail. He still runs an agency and gets 200 messages a day for work. He was surprised to get just 50 a day from the university.


We discussed the need to train journalism student to become "power" e-mail users. The toll e-mail can take on you is too great to ignore, just as the benefits are too great. We need a way to teach our students how to use e-mail as a vital part of their education.

Larry also agreed that the second technology we need to teach is online searching. I may try to work that into my research class, but it really should be introduced at the freshman level.