VCRHM 2019 Summary
Executive Summary
On April 18 and 19, 2019, VCRHM Members Cathryn Molloy, Lori Beth DeHertogh, Michael Klein, Kelly Pender, and Heidi Lawrence convened at James Madison University for the second annual colloquium, along with Brooke Covington, Katie Randall, and Julie Mengert of Virginia Tech, who participated in person, and Amy Reed, Hilary Selznick, and Kirk St.Amant who participated remotely.
During this meeting, we followed up on our primary finding from our first colloquium--to engage in a statewide project of interest to the rhetoric of health and medicine. Specifically, we decided to pursue a multi-site project related to rhetoric and the opioid crisis.
The summary below describes some of the exigencies of our 2019 meeting, draft plans following the colloquium, and plans for the 2020 colloquium.
Background: Following up from 2018
Team members learned a lot of lessons across the conceptualization, planning, and conduct of the first colloquium. From logistical concerns and managing the processes of organizing an event at GMU to timelines for more difficult decisions involving inclement weather, our team learned a lot about how to work together to plan an event that would be useful to participants while also being feasible for us to conduct.
Most significantly, though, we gained the following insights through the conduct of the colloquium and follow-on reporting activities:
The Project
Following the 2018 VCRHM, we knew that we wanted to pursue a project that was meaningful to us and to statewide objectives related to health and medicine. Consequently, the follow-on working group meeting decided to focus on theories and methods from RHM to apply to the opioid crisis. During this meeting, members of our team intended develop a distinct plan for a research project, develop data management plans, and outline specific plans for how to execute and fund those projects across the state. This was a starting point for our next steps as a research team.
2019 VCRHM Conduct
Thanks to funding from James Madison University, the 2019 VCRHM was able to convene in Harrisonburg on April 18 and 19, 2019. We made a number of changes to the format, including the following agenda, remote participation opportunities, and homework.
Agenda: Thursday, April 18
12:00 p.m. to 1:00 p.m.: Arrival/lunch
1:00 p.m. to 3:00 p.m.: Group brainstorming session. Discuss research interests, questions, and methods/methodologies for approaching the issue
3:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m.: Research session. Working individually, we will look at various literatures to gain initial insight into conversations. Populate shared Zotero folder with resources of note.
5:30 p.m.: Summarize research interests, items of note from literature review, and the next steps for Friday
6:30/7:00 p.m.: Dinner
Agenda: Friday, April 19
9:00 a.m. to 10:00 a.m.: Breakfast
***10:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m.: ONLINE SESSION.*** Mapping literature and research questions. Taking the previous day’s brainstorming and the beginning literature research we conducted on Thursday, we will aim to connect these concepts into specific project ideas. We will include remote participants in this discussion, catching them up on the previous day’s conversation, and all sharing insight and perspectives on what directions we could go and what background we would rely on to get there.
12:00 p.m. to 1:00 p.m.: Lunch
1:00 p.m. to 2:00 p.m.: Project mapping. What do we all want to do (collaboratively? individually? in smaller groups of collaborations? etc.)
2:00 p.m. to 4:00 p.m.: Team connections and next step planning. What project do you want to do? What might the next VCRHM look like?
4:00 p.m.: Adjourn
Homework
We are asked all online and in-person participants to arrive having completed three things:
1. Read Dopesick: Dealers, Doctors, and the Drug Company that Addicted America by Beth Macy.
2. Do some basic background research on the opioid problem in your area, or the facet of “the opioid crisis” of which you are most interested.
3. A scholarly article of note, populated in a group Zotero folder.
Outcomes
During our two days of meetings, we completed the following tasks:
Next Steps: VCRHM 2020
At the conclusion of our meeting, we decided to convene a third annual VCRHM in Blacksburg June 24-26, 2020. We also discussed future plans for funding and research develop to complete in the interim.
On April 18 and 19, 2019, VCRHM Members Cathryn Molloy, Lori Beth DeHertogh, Michael Klein, Kelly Pender, and Heidi Lawrence convened at James Madison University for the second annual colloquium, along with Brooke Covington, Katie Randall, and Julie Mengert of Virginia Tech, who participated in person, and Amy Reed, Hilary Selznick, and Kirk St.Amant who participated remotely.
During this meeting, we followed up on our primary finding from our first colloquium--to engage in a statewide project of interest to the rhetoric of health and medicine. Specifically, we decided to pursue a multi-site project related to rhetoric and the opioid crisis.
The summary below describes some of the exigencies of our 2019 meeting, draft plans following the colloquium, and plans for the 2020 colloquium.
Background: Following up from 2018
Team members learned a lot of lessons across the conceptualization, planning, and conduct of the first colloquium. From logistical concerns and managing the processes of organizing an event at GMU to timelines for more difficult decisions involving inclement weather, our team learned a lot about how to work together to plan an event that would be useful to participants while also being feasible for us to conduct.
Most significantly, though, we gained the following insights through the conduct of the colloquium and follow-on reporting activities:
- The graduate student mentoring and research component of the colloquium was incredibly valuable, but it isn’t needed as we conducted it every year. Though we have a number of graduate students completing projects in RHM across the commonwealth, an annual meeting isn’t entirely necessary for connection-building and mentoring of dissertation and thesis project.
- We also learned a lot about different faculty and student needs across the different collaborating institutions; the needs and incentives for different types of research and mentoring work vary greatly across each of our institutions, so having a space where we could share and better understand those differences was invaluable.
- We learned that we all really wanted to do a research project together. Though the colloquium was designed to create a space for collaboration and connection, there wasn’t quite time in the days to fully conceptualize a project and plan it out so that it could proceed out of the meeting.
The Project
Following the 2018 VCRHM, we knew that we wanted to pursue a project that was meaningful to us and to statewide objectives related to health and medicine. Consequently, the follow-on working group meeting decided to focus on theories and methods from RHM to apply to the opioid crisis. During this meeting, members of our team intended develop a distinct plan for a research project, develop data management plans, and outline specific plans for how to execute and fund those projects across the state. This was a starting point for our next steps as a research team.
2019 VCRHM Conduct
Thanks to funding from James Madison University, the 2019 VCRHM was able to convene in Harrisonburg on April 18 and 19, 2019. We made a number of changes to the format, including the following agenda, remote participation opportunities, and homework.
Agenda: Thursday, April 18
12:00 p.m. to 1:00 p.m.: Arrival/lunch
1:00 p.m. to 3:00 p.m.: Group brainstorming session. Discuss research interests, questions, and methods/methodologies for approaching the issue
3:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m.: Research session. Working individually, we will look at various literatures to gain initial insight into conversations. Populate shared Zotero folder with resources of note.
5:30 p.m.: Summarize research interests, items of note from literature review, and the next steps for Friday
6:30/7:00 p.m.: Dinner
Agenda: Friday, April 19
9:00 a.m. to 10:00 a.m.: Breakfast
***10:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m.: ONLINE SESSION.*** Mapping literature and research questions. Taking the previous day’s brainstorming and the beginning literature research we conducted on Thursday, we will aim to connect these concepts into specific project ideas. We will include remote participants in this discussion, catching them up on the previous day’s conversation, and all sharing insight and perspectives on what directions we could go and what background we would rely on to get there.
12:00 p.m. to 1:00 p.m.: Lunch
1:00 p.m. to 2:00 p.m.: Project mapping. What do we all want to do (collaboratively? individually? in smaller groups of collaborations? etc.)
2:00 p.m. to 4:00 p.m.: Team connections and next step planning. What project do you want to do? What might the next VCRHM look like?
4:00 p.m.: Adjourn
Homework
We are asked all online and in-person participants to arrive having completed three things:
1. Read Dopesick: Dealers, Doctors, and the Drug Company that Addicted America by Beth Macy.
2. Do some basic background research on the opioid problem in your area, or the facet of “the opioid crisis” of which you are most interested.
3. A scholarly article of note, populated in a group Zotero folder.
Outcomes
During our two days of meetings, we completed the following tasks:
- Discussed Dopesick, our main takeaways, and research interests
- Met with online, remote participants (Amy Reed, Rowan University; Hilary Selznick, Western Michigan University; and Kirk St.Amant, Louisiana Tech) to brainstorm other parts of the project and possible outcomes/outlets
- Identified our primary areas of research, articulated research questions, and made research assignments for our next two stages of planned outcomes (a conference panel proposal, draft chapters due May 2020)
- Assembled into preliminary teams for qualitative research program plans
Next Steps: VCRHM 2020
At the conclusion of our meeting, we decided to convene a third annual VCRHM in Blacksburg June 24-26, 2020. We also discussed future plans for funding and research develop to complete in the interim.