I am an employee of Portland Community College and have been teaching Speech Communication for over 15 years. Speech Communication is a broad discipline with a variety of areas: relationships (is it really credible to teach a subject for which one has little positive experience?), small group discussion, intercultural communication (yes, I teach Political Correctness but hell I am not a fanatic about it),

gender communication (men are from earth; women are from earth; deal with it), nonverbal communication (don't even think of saying "body language"!), specialty courses like Mass Media and Society, or Communication and Obesity, and of course the ever popular course: public speaking - persuasion, argumentation and reasoning. Teaching Public Speaking makes me about as popular as the dentist - ya know ya gotta go but ya dread it. I love teaching! I have found it to be the perfect forum for stand up comedy......well some

of the students laugh.....as well as to introduce skills which can change people's lives. Every time I teach any course - and I am the instructor on the Sylvania Campus who teaches all the oddball courses - I learn a bit more about and for myself.