Don't look at your shoes! Getting engineers and scientists to engage with audiences

A first-year graduate seminar is used to work with students to alleviate shyness, introversion and speaking anxiety, as well as providing a method for speaking effectiveness incorporating cultural cues when giving technical presentations. The core intent was to get students - particularly those who are not native English speakers - to be comfortable and to improve on monotonous, rote recitation from memorized scripts. The effort has been fortunate to draw on experienced speakers, workshop coordinators, theater and public speaking techniques. While this is a work in progress, ongoing assessment has shown remarkable results in individual student performance and comfort level in public speaking from a student demographic where this is not often the case.