Introduction

Welcome to Cornerstone!  

Communication skills–verbal, written, digital, and visual–are essential skills in the classroom, workplace, and community. Through this course you will gain the skills to read critically, research effectively, and create a variety of messages. This is a yearlong course where you will collaborate closely in a classroom community with your peers, professor, and a Peer Mentor.

The course includes shared experiences in your class and with other first-year students at UNI: common reading and speaking selections, campus engagement, meaningful writing and speaking opportunities, and learning about student supports available at UNI.

Cornerstone faculty are committed to creating inclusive and supportive learning communities that help students have important and sometimes difficult conversations with civility. Rod Library is pleased to support this important work by providing a customized, free textbook for this course.

Licensing and Attributions to Original Source Material

Introduction: Original content by Deb Young, Nikki Harken, and Anne Marie Gruber licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 4.0.

Chapters 1 and 3: Bad Ideas about Writing by Cheryl E. Ball & Drew M. Loewe, licensed under CC BY 4.0.

Chapters 2, portions of Chapter 4, Chapter 6 through portions of Chapters 10, Chapters 11 through 13, Chapters 15 through portions of 18, and Chapters 19 through 21: Communication in the Real World: An Introduction to Communication Studies, University of Minnesota Libraries Publishing edition, 2016, licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.

Portions of Chapter 4, and Chapter 22: Cereal is Soup: A Funky Little Book About Argument with Readings by Sybil Priebe, licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0. Readings are licensed separately.

Chapter 5: Reading Games: Strategies for Reading Scholarly Sources by Karen Rosenberg in Writing Spaces: Readings on Writing (volume 2) is licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0 and Effectively and Efficiently Reading the Credibility of Online Sources by Erin Carilla & Alice Horning in Writing Spaces: Readings on Writing (volume 4), licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.

Portions of Chapter 10: Critical Thinking in Academic Research by Cindy Gruwell & Robin Ewing, licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.

Chapter 14: Grammar, Rhetoric, and Style by Craig Hulst in Writing Spaces: Readings on Writing (volume 3), licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 and Workin' Languages: Who we are Matters in our Writing by Sara. P. Alvarez, Amy J. Wan, & Eunjeong Lee in Writing Spaces: Readings on Writing (volume 3), licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 4.0.

Portions of Chapter 18: Writing with your Peers by Raquel Corona, Kami Day, & Michele Eodice in Writing Spaces: Readings on Writing (volume 4), licensed under CC BY-ND 4.0.

Image Credits

Cover images: Campanile cornerstone, Lang Hall cornerstone, and Wright Hall etching photographs by Anne Marie Gruber, licensed CC BY 4.0; Rod Library, campus entranceway, and flowering tree photographs, Copyright University of Northern Iowa. All rights reserved.

All other image credits are provided throughout text.

Accessibility Statement

University of Northern Iowa's Rod Library is committed to making its publications as accessible as possible. Images in this resource have alternative text and heading styles are used throughout for compatibility with screen readers.

This ebook is displayed in the software Manifold; detailed documentation is available regarding Manifold's accessibility commitment and features.

Multiple formats are provided, including online ebook, pdf, and Google Doc. The open licensing of this work allows for translation and changing formats as needed for any user, without additional permissions needed, as long as proper attribution is given and the work license is followed.

If you have any requests for alternative formats or suggestions for improving accessibility of this OER, please contact anne.gruber@uni.edu.