From Students to Alumni: A Journey of Friendship, Journalism and Giving Back

 Yesterday, after many years, a group of former Divine Word University students sat down together for a small lunch at JP Hall, reconnecting with old friends and becoming part of the wider DWU community once again.

For many of us, the DWU we returned to was very different from the university we knew as students.

We came from an era of no air-conditioned classrooms, no internet, no PowerPoint projectors, no mobile phones and no social media. Fr. Jan Czuba was about five years into his presidency, and one phrase that seemed to capture his approach to the university was: “There is no standing still at DWU.”

As students, we experienced that passion for innovation and growth. While buildings such as the SVDMA and Friendship Library were taking shape, journalism students were out around Madang town talking to town managers, the PPC, supermarket owners, hotel chefs and others to find news stories.

We had weekly quotas of news stories to complete for our news writing and news production units. Classes began at 8am and often continued until 3.30pm, with seven to nine units in a semester.

We were fortunate to learn from lecturers including David Scoullar, Alastair and Johanna Whitson, Br. Michael McManus, Joe Webber, John Retallick, Patrick Matbob, Sr Eva Kusikova, Kevin Pamba, Adrian Kennedy and Alphonse Aime.

We were part of an era when DWU was transitioning from an institute into a more formal university. After graduation, we each followed our own paths, but the friendships formed during those years have endured.

Perhaps that is one of the special things about the DWU experience: it created bonds that continued long after graduation.

DWU has changed considerably since our student days, but the connection between the university and its alumni remains strong.

Yesterday's gathering was also an important step forward. Alumni met at the Arnold Jensen Hall to begin the process of formalising a national DWU alumni body, with the aim of creating a stronger network that can contribute to the university and support the implementation of its strategic objectives.

From students walking the streets of Madang looking for news stories to alumni returning to discuss how we can give back to the university, the journey has come a long way.

We may have left DWU many years ago, but clearly, DWU never really left us.

Communication Arts Alumni Share Industry Insights with Current Students

Current undergraduate students in the Communication Arts (Journalism) program at Divine Word University recently had the opportunity to hear from a group of accomplished alumni working across Papua New Guinea's media industry.

The alumni shared their experiences of working in journalism and reflected on their professional journeys since graduating from the Communication Arts program.

The session provided students with an opportunity to hear directly from former students about the realities of working in the media industry, the opportunities available to graduates and the skills needed to build a career in journalism.

The alumni who took part were:

Meredith Kusa, Mackhenly Kaiok, Annette Sete, Priscilla Winfrey, Dorothy Bengo, Scott Waide, Jeremy Mark, William Natera and Frank Genaia

Having alumni return to the university to engage with current students provides a valuable link between the classroom and the profession. Their experiences offer students practical perspectives as they prepare for careers in journalism and communication.

The Communication Arts Department thanks the alumni for taking the time to return and share their experiences with the next generation of Communication Arts graduates.

Making Student Research Visible: DWU Communication Arts Poster Presentation

What happens when students take their research off the page and put it on display?

You get three hours of conversations, questions, ideas and, most importantly, students proudly sharing work they have spent months developing.

In August, 14th August actually, I had the privilege of coordinating an Academic Poster Presentation for the final-year students of the Communication Arts Department at Divine Word University.

The event brought together our final-year students to present their undergraduate research through A0-sized academic posters. Each student had the challenge of taking an entire research project and communicating its most important elements in a single visual presentation.

For me, this was one of the most rewarding parts of the event.

I watched students stand beside their posters and explain their research to lecturers, colleagues and fellow students. They discussed their research questions, methodology and findings, responded to questions and, in the process, demonstrated something that is central to Communication Arts: the ability to communicate ideas effectively to an audience.

An academic poster is more than a large piece of paper.

It requires students to make decisions about what information matters, how it should be presented and how their audience will understand it. In that sense, the exercise was itself a practical communication experience.

It was also encouraging to see undergraduate research being given a public platform within the university.

I am grateful to ExxonMobil and Post-Courier for their funding support, which helped make the event possible. Partnerships such as these are important in creating opportunities for students to move beyond the classroom and share their work in meaningful ways.

As an educator, I believe we should create more opportunities for students to present, defend and communicate what they have learned, rather than seeing research as something that ends when an assignment is submitted.

Congratulations to all our final-year Communication Arts students who participated.

Your research deserves to be seen, discussed and celebrated.

And to everyone who helped make the event possible—thank you.

It was a privilege to coordinate this event and to see our students take ownership of their research.

#DivineWordUniversity #CommunicationArts #StudentResearch #AcademicPosters #HigherEducation #PapuaNewGuinea #Research #StudentLearning

PNG Media Council talks to the CA students and staff

 Today we had the PNG Media Council come talk to the CA Students. about the importance of digital journalism, AI use in media and current challenges faced by the media

Mr. Matthew Vari from Post Courier, Belinda Korah from, Reily Kanamon from BBC 

The staff and students of the Department had the opportunity to engage with the PNG Media Council on the changing landscape of journalism in Papua New Guinea.

The discussion focused on three key areas: digital journalism, the use of artificial intelligence (AI) in media, and current challenges facing the PNG media industry.

The session gave students an opportunity to hear directly from the media industry and reflect on how technological changes are affecting the way journalists work, produce news and engage with audiences.

The discussion on AI was particularly timely, highlighting the opportunities and challenges that emerging technologies present for journalism, including questions around accuracy, ethics and professional practice.

Industry engagement such as this provides Communication Arts students with valuable perspectives beyond the classroom and helps them better understand the realities of the profession they are preparing to enter.

The session also encouraged students to think critically about the future of journalism and their role as emerging media professionals in Papua New Guinea.

Ends//

Training students how to use mojo kits

 We had a session on Saturday morning on 11th July to train our students how to use a mobile journalism kit. The students were taught how to set up and shoot using the Mojo Kit. The kit comes in a back and in my estimate costs around K12,000-K15,000 for one. The most expensive item is the Iphone 16 max pro while various accessories are also in the bag  

The Facilitator was Ms. Maggie Veve who set and arranged the date and time for the training, She also was the primary trainer while I assisted where possible. These are year 4 students who are now in the last semester before they end their four year journey sometime in October. 

This was our first training session since we had travelled to Port Moresby in December last year to receive an introduction training run by ABC International Development (ABCID). 

After the short training (2 hours), we stopped at 12pm and then had some tea before dispersing. Training students how to use mobile journalism (mojo) kits is important for their learning as well. Visual storytelling is something even people like me still need to master but liklik save yumi helpim ol sumatin.

Beginning a journey

 On Wednesday I did a presentation about a study that I wished to pursue over a number of years. The series of presentations is hosted by the Postgraduate Research Centre and I was one of the students that did the presentation. Each semester, I have to present an update on my research progress. 

I know I have been teaching for a number of years but sometimes it can feel a bit daunting when you have professors, associate professors, academic doctors and other academics sit in.

Some of the students that turned up

Looking back now towards last year, my mind was not really on academic research. But by becoming a tutor in the research methods unit, I feel my confidence rose pregressively in the area of academic research as the number of weeks went on. I had undertaken Research Methods so many years ago at Curtin University. But like many things in life, if you do not practice using them, they become just a name and a distant memory. So becoming a tutor forced me to rediscover the notes that Dr. Graham Brown had taught me. I looked through his notes and this helped me to teach/tutor this unit. 

Anyway, it was my 15 minutes of fame and I got through it 😀

Impact of communications research on society

I believe that it is always good to have communications researchers impress upon undergraduate students the difference that communications research can make on society. 

 It was good to have Dr. Amanda Watson from the Australian National University come do a session with the CA4 students during my tutorial class on the impact of research on society. She was in Madang doing her research and is a visiting academic from ANU. We had invited her to come talk to our CA4 student on the importance communications research on society. 

She spoke of two examples of her research work on the Sim card registration in PNG that happened a couple of years ago and also on the Coral Sea submarine cables. 

-Here is her work on the submarine cables published on Marine Policy, Volume 178, August 2025: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0308597X25001502

Here is one of the research on the Sim Card Registration published in the Pacific Journalism Review, Volume 26, Issue 1, 2020: here https://scispace.com/pdf/mobile-phone-registration-in-papua-new-guinea-will-the-75yxa2gtg3.pdf

She also pointed out that as final year research students, there is an opportunity to showcase their work through writing journal articles, symposium presentations, etc so that the public becomes aware of their research. 

 

She pointed out that the recommendations part of their research should highlight changes thus could impact society such as policy changes, further research, practical work and methodological changes. 

Dr. Amanda once taught in the CA Department here at DWU sometime around 2004-2007. She is currently a visiting academic maintaining the partnership between DWU and ANU. 

Presenting Passion, Purpose, and Research

 Tonight marked the end of a long process to getting communication arts students to focus their research into communication/media studies. 

After Dr. Aime passed on, I was given the research unit to teach. One of my first steps was to make sure that students focused on their area of study - communication/media. Over the years, many students had placed their focus of their research into social areas. They did their research on water and sanitation, domestic violence, elections, primary school education, language loss, gun violence, etc. These were good areas to look at but they often missed having a communication or media component to it. Why study communication/media over 3-4 years and not focus on its key aspects?

So in semester 1 of 2025, when I took this students for a unit called CA418 Media and Communication Theories my main focus was to help students understand that they could use media/communications theories as a lens to look at communication/media problems in their respective social study. For example, if a student decided to study how students in primary schools used their lunch money, then the student would choose a communication theory to examine the problem. This process of learning was hard because it meant looking at definition of theory, their components and then understanding how they could use them. This led to the development of theoretical and conceptual frameworks in their research. 

Then in Semester 2 in PG317 Research Methods, the students were then introduced to the concepts of rationale for research, research perspective, research design and methods. The unit was coordinated by Sr. Miriam Dlugoz and department in our Faculty had a tutor. I took on the role of the tutor. I also began to look at social research a bit more and books by Creswell and also Crotty became important reading material for me. At the end of semester, they were to write a research proposal and get ethical clearance from the Faculty Research Committee to endorse and approve their study. 

Over the holiday the students collected data and when they returned for first semester in 2026, they took the unit PG427 Data Analysis and Report Writing. In this unit they began to prepare their data, analyse their data and then develop their findings using themes (thematic analysis). Again it is an intensive process which required a greater understanding of how data analysis works and how it can have an effect on their findings. At the end of the semester, they have to produce a 6,000-8,000 word report. I often use the term dissertation but maybe a better word would be just a report. 

So tonight was the night where they presented their research findings to the fellow students including their friends, family and supporters. It was great to see them present and many presented really well. 

The CA4 Class of 2026

One of the presenters sharing their research 

For undergraduate students, this is their first taste of academic research. Some may find their passion in this kind of work and others might not and gravitate towards other journalism skills. Its been a long couple of semesters for these students but its been worth it. For myself this research methods and writing process over three semester has actually made me appreciate the importance of proper academic research. I knew a small bit about research but this couple of semesters have actually helped me understand the research process better. 

MFD at Lutheran Day 26

 Yes it is another Media Freedom Day!

This year I was assigned to Lutheran Day Primary School. I went with the students and they did their thing and I took pictures. I'll let the photos do the talking here:

I love these young people' energy. They are excited and ready to go. Its always a pleasure to teach them.