Career & Tools
They walked like elephants, buzzed like bumblebees, swam like a school of fish, and hugged like long-lost friends. All while barefoot. These were UC Santa Barbara graduate students and postdocs, learning the fundamentals of stage presence in Drama Instructor Jeff Mills’ four-hour “Stage Training for Academic Presenters” workshop.
They walked like elephants, buzzed like bumblebees, swam like a school of fish, and hugged like long-lost friends. All while barefoot. These were UC Santa Barbara graduate students and postdocs, learning the fundamentals of stage presence in Drama Instructor Jeff Mills' four-hour "Stage Training for Academic Presenters" workshop on Friday, February 20.
The aim of the inaugural workshop, hosted by the UCSB Graduate Division, was to help graduate students and postdocs improve their communication skills, build confidence, and form connections with an audience. These skills could then be used to successfully convey the significance of their scholarly work to a broad audience, whether that's at the upcoming Grad Slam competition in April, in a research talk at an academic conference, or at some other public venue.
The graduate students and postdocs came from across the disciplinary map. Materials, Education, Bren School, Physics, Anthropology, Spanish and Portuguese, and Electrical and Computer Engineering were just some of the disciplines represented.
Mills started out by asking all of the participants to remove their shoes and go barefoot, the better to "get comfortable and creative with our bodies," he said.
The workshop was dominated by physical activities, vocal exercises, and creative improvisation. There was crawling, shouting, jumping, and "birdbath" breathing. The students recited words and phrases (repeating "Bodega, Topeka, Bodega, Topeka"); beat their chests while humming; and massaged their jaws and temples.
In one exercise, participants in a single-file line mimicked the movements of the "leader" in front of them. New leaders emerged with their own movements, to be followed by the others. Some of the leaders were simple and clear in their movements. Mills said it is much easier for other participants and an audience to follow if movements are simple and repetitive.
In the final section of the workshop, the students and postdocs one by one recited the Prologue in Shakespeare's "Henry V." They were asked to select words to emphasize.
Mills said all of the exercises, which are used in stage training for actors, accomplished multiple goals. "What we were working on was finding physical presence and different ways that we can be present in the space," he said, as well as "make people listen to us without having to try too hard or be too intense about it."
The workshop offered techniques for emphasizing words, he said, by using pitch, intensity, and volume; as well as getting "control of the breath and warming up the voice so it can carry across a room."
Mills noticed a marked difference in the graduate students and postdocs by the conclusion of workshop. "At the beginning they were hiding, and by the end they were all good buddies and friends, and they were way less inhibited," he said. "I heard a clarity in their voices that I hadn't heard at the beginning. Even with the people whose primary language wasn't English, I was hearing words in a much clearer way. Certainly their communication was much clearer."
We asked a few of the participants why they took the workshop and how it helped them. Here's what they told us:
Alexandre Streicher, a first-year Physics Ph.D. student, said: "I took this workshop because I believe communication skills to be vital to the dissemination of one's ideas and theories, especially in my field of theoretical physics," he said. "I believe that I gained a new perspective on presentations. In addition, I was made aware of the many different techniques to emphasize points in speech."
Lisa McAllister, a Ph.D. student in Anthropology (with an emphasis in Integrative Anthropological Sciences), who was featured in the GradPost in 2013, is in her final year and writing up her dissertation. She competed in the Grad Slam last year and hopes to compete again this year. One of the critiques she received last year was "my so-to-speak stage presence," and Lisa wanted to do better, both in the Grad Slam and in other venues.
"I am presenting at a conference in May that is extremely professional and prestigious," she said. "Despite a lot of teaching experience and having presented at many other conferences, I am very nervous about giving this talk. I signed up for the workshop to help combat my nerves and improve my public speaking skills. I also know I appear nervous when talking, as I move around a lot. I hoped the workshop would help give me more of a confident and grounded presence." She is happy she participated. "I gained a better sense and awareness of my body on stage, and some neat vocal tricks for focusing attention on me and speaking loudly and clearly in a large space. Hopefully it will help me give a clear and confident presentation in May."
Kayla McLaughlin, who is pursuing both a Ph.D. in Iberian Linguistics, with an emphasis in Applied Linguistics, and a Certificate in College and University Teaching (CCUT), said: "One of my personal goals for this year is to present at a conference, which I've never done before. I wanted to take this workshop to boost my confidence in myself and learn some skills that might make the idea of presenting in front of a bunch of academics a bit less intimidating."
Kayla, who is about to start a new research project and hopes to compete in the Grad Slam in 2016, added: "I feel like the workshop really helped me practice the idea of 'just going with it' and not letting my nervousness get the best of me. A lot of the activities we did definitely pushed me outside of my normal comfort zone, which was a bit scary, but I left the workshop that day feeling empowered and thinking, 'Well, if I can do that, then presenting at a conference should be a breeze!'"
