Daniel Drolet
Department of Communication professor Luc Dupont believes he is a better teacher for knowing how to talk to the media.
“I have always thought that a good professor was someone who was able, in a few minutes, to explain an apparently more complex problem,” says Dupont, adding that “the art of being able to go to the heart of the matter” serves him well in his job.
His ease in front of a microphone has won him this year's Rector's Award for service to the University through media and community relations. Sharing the award with him is Department of Geography professor Barry Wellar. The award recognizes members of the University community who share their knowledge and expertise by collaborating with the media.
Wellar, too, sees advantages in having his name appear in the press. He says a single report on TV, radio or in a newspaper can reach more people in one day than a scholarly journal can in an entire year.
He says he is often pleasantly surprised by the public's reaction to his ideas: the feedback he gets, he says, is often very intelligent and useful.
In fact, so strongly is he convinced about the usefulness of academics being media-savvy that he literally gives bonus points to students who get their names in print.
Students, he says, tend to do things the way their professors want them done; they also need to be able to communicate with ordinary folk. “Ordinary citizens are paying our salaries and they have a right to know what we're doing,” Wellar says.
Journalists, meanwhile, are thankful when they come across a professor who knows their needs.
“What we're looking for when we are putting together a news report is clarity and the capacity to easily express complex issues in such a way as to make them accessible to a large number of people,” says Stéphane Leclerc, news editor with Radio-Canada.
Leclerc says a mutually beneficial relationship can develop between a reporter and an academic who know what the media need. In fact, he says he would like to see more such relationships develop, because there are many professors doing interesting work that is never written about.
Ottawa Citizen reporter Joanne Laucius says today, fewer professors “are afraid that if they popularize their research, other experts will look down on them and put them in the showboat category.” She says academics increasingly realize that there can be monetary benefits to being well known.
Dupont agrees that visibility is important. He says it shows that a professor is able to not only teach, but also explain. When he arrived at the University of Ottawa a few years ago, he says he immediately sensed that contact with the media was encouraged, and that pleased him.
“I think it makes a professor's life easier when you know that,” he said. “It's not every university that will encourage its professors to talk to media.”
