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{Home > About > Centers & Programs > IAP > Fellowships : Aimee Thompson-Whiteside}

Aimee Thompson-Whiteside

Aimee Thompson-Whiteside is a Master's Student in the Rhetoric Department. She is also the Undergraduate Adviser for the 2001-2002 academic year.

Q: What sort of research have you done with Unisys, and who are you working with?

Aimee: To answer your first question about the sort of research I'm doing with Unisys, it revolves around looking at the undergraduate curriculum of any recent graduate, say in the last two to three years in an undergraduate program, and comparing that to the tasks that they perform as a technical communicator out in the work force. The purpose is to see if there are any skills that maybe they don't have that they need as they enter the work force, and that's what the research will hopefully uncover as we go along.

I'm working with Mark Meinhart, the group manager for product information, and I'll also be working with Liza Allen.

Q: How has the research been going so far?

Aimee: It's going well. I'm in the preliminary stages at this point, looking to complete a literature review in the next month or so, and then complete the questionnaire that I'll use for phone interviews as I contact the recent grads more towards later fall, early winter.

Q: The current fellowships began towards the end of May, so have you been working on this over the summer?

Aimee: This also corresponds with my master's thesis, so I've actually been working on this and molding for quite some time now. I started even a little bit before May.

Q: This sort of leads to the next question—how does this interact with your academic research?

Aimee: This directly corresponds with my master's thesis. I'm very excited to be able to explore this topic, and the fellowship gives me the opportunity to do some case studies that I would not have been able to do without the fellowships, so I'm very grateful to have that opportunity.

Q: What is your master's thesis based on?

Aimee: Well, the methodology is that I will conduct phone interviews. Right now I have it scheduled as 381 interviews, although it might be less than that, with technical communicators that have graduated from an undergraduate program in technical communication within the last two or three years. And I'll have a tool, I haven't created it at this point, but I hope to make it no more than fifteen minutes of their time and go through the questions. To supplement that, I'd like to do case studies where I go into their work space and talk about the tasks that they perform, the skills that they need, and how their undergraduate curriculum has helped them, or how it could use improvement.

Q: I know we have the technical communication major here at the U of MN, but what other schools have you been looking at?

Aimee: I've been looking at a number of different schools, like the University of Washington and MIT, but I know of at least 30 other schools with technical communication programs.

Q: Did you propose your fellowship idea to Unisys, or did you choose from a list of available fellowships?

Aimee: They had a list of different items I could pick from, and one of the items matched up -- it discussed the academic preparation for the workplace, and right away I saw that matched with my interests and my master's thesis, and what Unisys was looking for, and I was hoping it would be a good match and it turned out that it was. So it turned out to be a direct correlation, and I'm just grateful to have the fellowship opportunity.

Q: How has it been like working with Unisys so far?

Aimee: So far I haven't had a lot of contact. I've left a few messages, and during the summer it's difficult to connect with different individuals. I think it's going to be a great relationship; I'm really looking forward to it as something that will last for years to come. As I've said, we're in the preliminary stages now, but I'm very optimistic and very excited.

Q: Do you see any further relations developing between yourself and Unisys?

Aimee: Possibly—it's difficult to tell at this point. I'm also very involved in the Society for Technical Communication, so I always see ways to network and connect with professionals and any opportunity like the Industrial Affiliates Program that allows you to network and connect with industry. I think it's just a wonderful opportunity and something that is very necessary to build that bridge between the academic world and business and industry.

Q: So would you recommend the fellowship program to other graduate students?

Aimee: Absolutely. I want to recommend it to masters students as well as doctoral students, and let them know that they can make a link between the area that they're interested in and the organizations that are involved in the Industrial Affiliates Program. The relationship that you create and the network you create will be with you forever.

Q: Anything else you'd like to add?

Aimee: I just want to reiterate and thank the fellowship program and the industrial affiliate program for this opportunity. The link between business and academia is a necessary one, and thank them for building that bridge for us.