Due Dates:

• Meeting Agenda are due 24 hours before each meeting.
• Meeting Minutes are due 24 hours after each meeting.
• Your video should be turned in no later than 24 hours prior to the presentation date.
• See the calendar for your section presentation dates.
• Peer evaluations must be completed within one week of the final presentation.

Purpose

Group projects are a common assignment in coursework, and a common feature of most jobs. However, students almost never are taught how to manage a group project. This assignment gives students the opportunity to learn how to manage a group project and the different roles required, while also providing ample opportunities to observe team and small group communication in action.

Skills

In this assignment you will:

• Collaborate as part of a team.
• Prepare common meeting products (Agenda, Minutes).
• Receive anonymous peer feedback about your collaboration style.

Knowledge

This assignment will also help you become familiar with the following important content in this discipline:

• Using communication technologies
• Group project management

Task

You will be assigned into a 4-6 person group at random. Your group will create an idea for a product that will solve a common campus problem. Your product should be larger than a backpack, but smaller than a couch. You will need to make a prototype of this product. Awful prototypes are encouraged – do not spend any of your own money on this project. Then, storyboard, script, and star in a commercial designed to attract investors. You will submit the video electronically at least 24 hours before class on the due date. On presentation day, you need to bring the script, storyboard, and prototype to the class. We will watch the commercials as a class, then vote on the winner. You also need to be prepared to discuss what you learned about group communication by participating in this project.

You will need to prepare one agenda and one set of minutes for a meeting as part of this project (this means you will need to meet face-to-face at least once for every member of the group). Your textbook has a great discussion on how to prepare a meeting agenda (B&M Appendix A). Agenda should be emailed to the group (copy me) and posted on Moodle no later than 24 hours before the meeting they apply to. Minutes should be emailed to the group (copy me) and posted on Moodle no later than 24 hours after the meeting they apply to.

To complete the assignment, you will need to:

1. Build a prototype a product.
2. Create a script and storyboard for a commercial.
3. Film the commercial and submit it.
4. Plan one of your group meetings: distribute and upload the Agenda.
5. Take Minutes at one of your group meetings: distribute and upload them.
6. Complete an anonymous peer evaluation of your group members.

Criteria for Success

This presentation is graded for completion out of 150 points. Half of these points (75) are earned as a group and half (75) are earned individually.

See the group grading rubric and the individual rubric for detail. You should also look over the agenda rubric and the minutes rubric.