How Do Students and Practitioners (Actually) Analyze Users?  

This paper reports on some disconnects between best practice teaching principles about user analysis and actual student practice. This research documents the facts of these disconnects and indicates some of their causes. Recommendations for academia and industry are offered. stereotypes to derive a model of audience. To what extent, however, does principle inform practice?

Levine, Barbara J. STC Proceedings (2005). Articles>Education>Audience Analysis

Moving Between Academe and Industry: Lessons Learned  

The author discusses her transition from academic professor to corporate worker and back to academic professor. She compares and contrasts some fundamental differences between these environments on the dimensions of teaching, research, collaboration, problem solving, and ethics. She describes some of the lessons she learned as she moved back and forth across these environments. She concludes by suggesting that, however large these transitions seem, they are transitions we routinely expect our students to make when they migrate from school to work.

Levine, Barbara J. STC Proceedings (2003). Articles>Collaboration>Industry and Academy

Practitioners as Students: What We Can Learn About Teaching Usability  

This paper presents the results of a study that contributes to our understanding of how to conduct and manage usability in the workplace. The study’s participants provided the dual perspective of practitioners working in industry and who are simultaneously enrolled in graduate studies. Recommendations for industry and academia are offered. The results have implications for helping technical communication professionals prepare for their expanding role in user-centered design.

Levine, Barbara J. STC Proceedings (2004). Articles>Education>Usability>Workplace