INTRODUCTION
The State of UX in Technical and Professional Communication: Courses, Programs, Jobs, G. Getto, J. T. Labriola, and A. Lancaster, Guest Editors
As the technical and professional communication (TPC) field has evolved in response to broader changes in the world economy, numerous professions have arisen within its ranks that co-exist with the traditional roles of technical writer and technical editor. These include instructional design, content strategy, and user experience design (UX). Including training in numerous professions within a single college major or program is a unique challenge for TPC. Some programs have chosen to focus on specific professions, even going so far as to rename their program around that profession. Others have continued to focus broadly on the overall field while updating their curricula as needed to serve students seeking training in a particular career path.
INTEGRATIVE LITERATURE REVIEW
The State of UX Pedagogy, P. B. Gallagher and G. Getto
A considerable amount of scholarship has amassed over the last 20 years regarding the teaching of user experience design (UX), but there has been no systematic attempt to review this literature. Rhetorical theory provides technical communication literature reviews with keen discourse analysis, and critical thinking offers objectivity to the evaluation. Our review of sources revealed a variety of trends and a remarkably diverse conversation on UX, including various definitions of UX pedagogy, and a large variety of theoretical orientations, educational models, instructional approaches, industry influences, methods, and ethical concerns. From this diverse corpus, we hazard a unifying definition centered on teaching the UX process through hands-on approaches such as engaged learning.
RESEARCH ARTICLES
Longitudinal Study of Usability and User Experience in Technical and Professional Communication Research, E. Friess and C. Liles
Prior studies on the role of usability/UX in TPC have found that usability/UX appears infrequently in TPC research and curriculum requirements. However, usability/UX remains a routinely referenced core identity of TPC. Our study shows that less than 8% of the total publications in the field are tied to usability/UX, though the percentage has increased in the most recent timeframe (2020-2022). Publications are shifting from research that expands usability/UX knowledge to research that uses usability/UX to explain TPC phenomena. Additionally, the object of analysis has shifted to process-centric analysis, design thinking has become an increasing component of TPC usability/UX research, and over a quarter of the research on usability/UX provided did not provide enough methodological description to enable replicability. Although usability/UX has been consistently published in the TPC research journals, the amount of research suggests that usability/UX is not core to TPC’s field identity.
Finding the Gap: A Comparison of UX Industry Practices and UX Course Outcomes in TPC Programs, S. J. Cosgrove
Although there is some scholarship addressing competencies required for UX positions as well as some investigation into UX course content within TPC programs, there is still a need for a comparative analysis of outcomes in UX courses in TPC and industry expectations for UX positions. A qualitative content analysis of UX job advertisements and UX course outcomes shows job ads prioritize on project management including Agile and Scrum, and other skills such as writing, designing prototypes, software and coding languages, and portfolios. Course outcomes reflect strengths in writing and design, but do not include significant reference to specific concepts or tools. Suggestions for improving TPC/UX courses include diversifying existing skills and addressing deficient skills in project management and digital literacies.
CASE STUDY
What Can Technical and Professional Communication Do for UX Education: A Case Study of a User-Experience Graduate Certificate, Q. Zhou and Z. C. Moeggenberg
Our user experience (UX) graduate certificate is a 16-credit, fully online program that can be completed in nine months. Such programs have sprung up across the academy and industry, but little scholarship has examined their effectiveness. We conducted 13 semi-structured interviews to examine what draws learners into the program and how it has helped them in their career advancement.We found that a short-term, asynchronous certificate program is effective for novice learners to get into the field and advance their careers. Our program’s most prominent strengths include its conceptual depth, quality of teaching, and flexible learning.The power of TPC programs’ rhetorical foundation enables them to cultivate UX leaders and advocates. In turn, UX education helps TPC programs adapt to the changing landscape of higher education.
TEACHING CASES
Fostering Advocacy, Developing Empathetic UX Bricoleurs: Ongoing Programmatic Assessment and Responsive Curriculum Design, S. J. Kowalewski and B. Williamson
We share our programmatic journey that represents more than a decade of reflection and evolution, culminating in the launch of a re-designed major and a user-experience design minor in a standalone department at a regional, primarily undergraduate teaching-focused university. Our programmatic identity began to shift toward a designer mindset that embraced three core frames for professional action—information design, problem solving, and civic engagement—and three complementary design tenets—empathy, advocacy, and bricolage. Our self-study data indicated that our students would benefit from stronger audience awareness and design competencies. We discuss curricular revisions, which include creating a UXD minor.
Toward Integrated UX Instruction with Symbiotic Classrooms, K. M. Jacobsen and D. DeVasto
Preparing students for UX careers requires instruction in several courses in a degree program, but adding courses is a slow process. For this collaboration, we forged a relationship between a lower- and upper-class course to introduce students to UX early in their program and apply additional UX methods in several. A close reading of test plans, usability reports, and reflection essays from 200-level students provided key insights into the understanding of UX strategies. Introductory students struggled to make explicit connections between UX strategies and their work but gained UX skills by the end of the project.Students realized many benefits learning about and conducting UX research that helped them become more empathetic professional writers.