Next week, I join 38 other UNC-Chapel Hill faculty members on a five-day bus tour across the state — from Shackleford Banks to Cherokee. The Tar Heel Bus Tour was launched in 1997 to give new faculty members a head start on learning about the state we serve.
Most of the stops are at sites where folks from Chapel Hill are working with local folks to research and solve some sort of health, economic or environmental problem. (I was curious to see that none of the stops had much to do directly with the civic or political health of the state.)
I’ll be writing about the trip here with an eye on two questions:
- Where, when and how do the North Carolinians we meet get information about the world around them?
- What does/could “engaged scholarship” look like for journalism and mass communication?
As you read next week, please e-mail me if you have any thoughts or questions about our experiences. I’m ryan DOT thornburg AT unc DOT edu . <!– var prefix = 'ma' + 'il' + 'to'; var path = 'hr' + 'ef' + '='; var addy97889 = 'ryan.thornburg' + '@'; addy97889 = addy97889 + 'unc' + '.' + 'edu'; document.write( '‘ ); document.write( addy97889 ); document.write( ‘‘ ); //–>n <!– document.write( '‘ )