Journalism 18 | DEV College of Media

Alumni inducted into Illini Media Company’s Hall of Fame

The Illini Media Company, which oversees The Daily Illini student newspaper, WPGU 107.1 FM radio station, and the Illio yearbook, inducted 20 people into its Class of 2022 Hall of Fame at a ceremony on April 9, 2022. Fourteen were College of Media alumni, including:

the late Nelson Algren (BS ’31, journalism), winner of 1950 National Book Award for Fiction for The Man with the Golden Arm
Susan J. Smith Cornwell (BS ’77, journalism), retired congressional correspondent at Reuters
Amara Enyia (BS ’05, journalism), Chicago attorney and activist
Jon Hansen (BS ’06, journalism), Emmy Award-winning host of WGN’s “Your Money Matters”
Paula Kamen (BS ’89, journalism), author of the book Finding Iris Chang, about her friend and Illinois journalism classmate
John J. Kim (BS ’97, advertising), photographer at Chicago Tribune and winner of 2011 Pulitzer Prize with reporting team at Chicago Sun-Times
Natasha Korecki (BS ’96, journalism), senior national political reporter at NBC News
Will Leitch (BS ’98, journalism), contributing editor at New York Magazine, founder of Deadspin, MLB.com national correspondent, and author
the late Allan R. Loudell (BS ’77, radio & TV), National Association of Broadcasters Crystal Radio Award winner
Steve Osunsami (BS ’93, journalism), Emmy Award-winning senior national correspondent at ABC News
John Paul (BS ’77, radio & TV; MS ’10, journalism), retired TV broadcaster at WCIA-TV in Champaign and journalism instructor at UIUC
Rick Sallinger (BS ’71, MS ’72, advertising), Peabody Award-winning reporter at CBS4 in Denver, Colorado
Bernard Schoenburg (BS ’76, journalism), retired political journalist
Pat Wingert (BS ’77, journalism), reporter at Hechinger Institute on Education and the Media, former correspondent at Newsweek

The members were recognized for “their distinguished professional careers and contributions to Illini Media as students, professional staff, and alumni,” according to the Illini Media website.

Photo courtesy of the Illini Media Company.

Row 1 (left to right): Bernard Schoenburg, Rick Sallinger, Susan J. Smith Cornwell, Pat Wingert Kelly, Paula Kamen

Row 2: Ralph Nozaki, Jon Hansen, Natasha Korecki, Will Leitch, John Paul, Sean Long

Row 3: Ann Dwyer, Steve Osunsami, Brad Fuhr, John J. Kim

Q&A with Mike Vainisi

Mike Vainisi (BS ’08, journalism) is head of original content at ATTN:. In Spring 2022, he was part of a Media Career Night alumni panel that discussed working in entertainment and Hollywood. (Watch the recording.)

How did you go about picking journalism as your major?
As someone who loved writing in high school, journalism was a great way of turning that interest and passion into a career. It is a very versatile major and you come out of it with a very strong writing background. At first, I saw myself becoming a journalist or reporter, but as time went on, I developed an interest in politics. At a certain point, I decided I wanted to work on political campaigns, which I ended up doing after graduation. Working on political campaigns, I utilized the same skill sets I learned as a journalism major such as communication, writing, and social media. Majoring in journalism ended up being a great background for this career.

What are some of your career highlights so far?
Right now, I oversee media content at a media company called ATTN: in California. We are a combination of a publisher and production company, so we program to social media companies but also make original content, like TV shows, which we then sell to streaming services. I have worked on specials in 2020 to promote voting in the election, featuring three presidents including former President Obama. At this job, I’ve been able to merge my interests in journalism, content creation in media, and politics, which has been a very fun experience.

How do you think the College of Media prepared you for your successful career?
I think the hard skills that you develop are one of the most important skills to have. As someone who hires people, it is super helpful to know that a potential hire has strong writing skills. The same applies to editing, broadcasting, and design. When you’re in school you may not think about it as much, but you begin the process of developing these core skills. I still use the skills that I learned in my editing classes 13 years ago, which is an aspect of my education that was very helpful.

What advice do you have for current journalism students or Media students? What would you have done differently?
Be very flexible in terms of how you want to apply your skills from a career point-of-view. A good way to maintain your flexibility is by maintaining an array of skills. For example, if you are majoring in journalism, then learn how to video edit. A lot of publishers or journalism outlets want to hire writers who can also be, in a way, their own producers. Being able to have those skills to successfully tell a story with the different aspects of media you have learned is incredibly useful. Overall, trying to be as dynamic as you can and maintaining the ability to tell stories no matter what the format is, I’ve found to be vital.

—Interview by Daniela Mejia, New Voices Intern

Media faculty and TAs make list of teachers ranked as excellent

Congratulations to all of the College of Media faculty, instructors, and teaching assistants who were ranked as excellent by their students!

This list is based on Instructor and Course Evaluation System (ICES) questionnaire forms completed by students during the Fall 2021 semester and Winter 2021-2022. Only those instructors who distributed ICES forms at least once during this time period and who released their data for publication are included in the list. View the complete list.

Note: * denotes that the instructor ratings were outstanding

ADVERTISING

BRITTANY DUFF – ADV 284

JACOB FISHER – ADV 283, 305

STEVE HALL – ADV 150

CHANG-DAE HAM – ADV 460, 587

JACQUELINE HITCHON – ADV 283

TERRY KASDAN – ADV 409

AMANDA MABRY-FLYNN – ADV 283

EWA MASLOWSKA – ADV 460

* SHACHAR MERON – ADV 498

* MARISA PEACOCK – ADV 350, 491

SELA SAR – ADV 550

LEONA YI-FAN SU – ADV 581

JOURNALISM

CHRISTOPHER BALL – JOUR 101, 451

STEPHANIE CRAFT – JOUR 505

ALISON DAVIS – JOUR 210, 340

KEN ERDEY – JOUR 217

CHRIS EVANS – JOUR 200

CAROL LOMBARDI – JOUR 220

STEPHEN WARREN – JOUR 453

MEDIA & CINEMA STUDIES

AMANDA CIAFONE – MACS 317

CL COLE – MACS 351

JOSH HEUMAN – MACS 264, 320

JON KNIPP – MACS 282

DEREK LONG – MACS 261, 503

JENNY OYALLON-KOLOSKI – MACS 203

STRATEGIC BRAND COMMUNICATION

JACQUELINE HITCHON – SBC 503

SHACHAR MERON – SBC 500

TEACHING ASSISTANTS

* A. CANO – MACS 100

C. CHEN – ADV 460

J. PYO – MACS 100

College of Media faculty appointed to Associate Dean positions

April 8, 2022 | Holly Rushakoff

Two faculty from the College of Media have been appointed by Dean Tracy Sulkin to associate dean positions starting August 16.

Announced in January, Stephanie Craft, currently professor and head of the Department of Journalism, will serve as the College of Media’s Associate Dean for Academic Affairs.

Announced in March, Jason P. Chambers, currently associate professor and associate head of the Charles H. Sandage Department of Advertising, and Dean’s Fellow for Diversity and Inclusion, will serve as the College of Media’s inaugural Associate Dean for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion.

“I am pleased to welcome Professors Chambers and Craft to their important new roles, and I look forward to working closely with them,” Sulkin said. “Their strong administrative skills, commitment to the college and our mission, and consultative approach to decision-making make them both excellent additions to the College of Media leadership team.”

Craft, a scholar of news literacy and journalism ethics, joined the Illinois faculty in 2013. She has taught courses such as History of American Journalism, Introduction to Journalism, and Journalism Ethics & Diversity. She has served as head of the Department of Journalism from August 2018 until January 2022. Last summer, the third edition of her book Principles of American Journalism: An Introduction, coauthored with Charles N. Davis, was published.

“I have appreciated the opportunity to help my department colleagues work toward their goals but am now looking forward to the chance the associate dean role offers to take a broader view of the work we do in the college and how it connects to the rest of campus and beyond,” Craft said.

While on sabbatical this semester, Craft has continued her work to create a news literacy scale, and has been developing a summer media literacy workshop for high school teachers along with other faculty in the College of Media and the College of Education. She has also begun a new research project.

“The new project involves delving into the archives of one of the first major journalistic collaborations, called the Arizona Project,” Craft said. “I’m hoping to get a better sense of how the collaboration worked and how it set the stage (or didn’t) for future large-scale projects involving journalists from competing news organizations.

In her new position, Craft will facilitate college-level promotion and tenure processes; mentor Dean’s Fellows; liaise with campus offices on college participation in strategic initiatives; facilitate policy discussions among unit leadership; and coordinate professional development programming for junior and midcareer faculty; among other responsibilities.

“I am eager to work on the college’s professional education initiatives and think about how we can serve a variety of different kinds of students, both on campus and online,” Craft added.

Chambers joined the Sandage Department of Advertising faculty in 2001 and the Institute of Communications Research faculty in 2003. He is a scholar of advertising history, particularly the contributions of African Americans to the industry. He has taught courses including Classic Campaigns, Advertising History, and Multicultural Advertising.

In his new position, Chambers is excited about working with his colleagues “to drive change and link our faculty, staff, and students to all of the opportunities that diversity provides.”

Over the past several years, the College of Media has prioritized expanding its programming in the area of diversity, equity, and inclusion, and the projects that Chambers facilitated during his two-year term as Dean’s Fellow for Diversity and Inclusion will continue to be part of his portfolio. The Alumni Mentoring Program, which connects students with accomplished alumni to share perspectives and advice, will continue to grow. The pilot focused on Black students and Black alumni, and then expanded to Latinx students and alumni. Chambers will also continue his involvement in the New Voices Internship Program, which provides opportunities for first-generation students and those from underrepresented groups to work with College of Media faculty and staff on communications projects.

He will also work with colleagues across the college and on campus to coordinate workshops on diversity, equity, inclusion, and anti-racism that are relevant to Media faculty, students, and staff, and will seek ways to further the college’s capacity in this area.

“Leadership at the department, college, and campus levels have put real resources behind diversity initiatives,” Chambers said. “I want to ensure that the College of Media continues to take advantage of all the grants and other funding sources that the campus is making available for diversity-related topics.”

Chambers’s latest book Positive Realism: The Life of Advertising Pioneer Thomas J. Burrell has been submitted to the publisher for final review, with an expected publication date of 2023. He is also the author of Madison Avenue and the Color Line: African Americans in the Advertising Industry and Building the Black Metropolis: African American Entrepreneurship in Chicago.

Meyerson’s Chicago Public Square named best free daily roundup in your inbox by ‘Chicago Reader’

Charlie Meyerson (BS ’77, MS ’78, journalism), who creates ChicagoPublicSquare.com was named in the Chicago Reader’s Best of Chicago edition for “Best free daily roundup in your inbox.”

“Square reflects all facets of Meyerson’s rich personality, his ear for news, his eye for finding interesting takes on that news, and his taste for quirky bits of human interest,” wrote Chicago Reader critic Jack Helbig.

Chicago Public Square is an email newsletter that Meyerson began producing in 2017. He has spent four decades as a journalist, working in Chicago newsrooms at various radio stations, as well as at the Chicago Tribune.

King to serve as inaugural director of Frank Center for Leadership and Innovation in Media

After a successful run as the executive producer for MSNBC’s The 11th Hour with Brian Williams, Colleen King decided to shift her career focus from broadcast TV news to education, pursuing her master’s in journalism and mass communication.

Her new path has led her to become the inaugural director of the Richard and Leslie Frank Center for Leadership and Innovation in Media and a clinical assistant professor of journalism.

King, who joined the College of Media in February, looks forward to providing students with “front-row seats” to professional journalism today as programming ramps up at the Frank Center.

She hopes that students will be able to hear from high-profile speakers, get connected with internship opportunities, and learn from professionals directly through panels, workshops, and symposia.

“I want to fulfill the Franks’ mission of making Illinois a top choice for all future journalists and I want every media professional to think of UIUC graduates as the best potential talent for their newsrooms,” King said.

King, who spent 17 years at news outlets from CBS News to Fox News, has produced political news about such high-profile events as presidential elections, inaugurations, and Supreme Court nominations, as well as other national news stories such as the Parkland, Florida, school shooting and several devastating hurricanes.

Colleen King in control room — Colleen King works in the control room during *The 11th Hour.*

During her time at The 11th Hour, King helped the show transform from what was supposed to be a six-week, half-hour news digest to a permanent full-hour program that became the number one rated cable newscast in the 11 p.m. time slot.

“I loved my time in television and I am so proud of all of the time and effort I put into that work,” she said. “Some of my most rewarding moments in journalism were working with younger team members and staffers and watching them learn and develop skills that helped them rise through the ranks in journalism, so [the transition] was a natural progression for me,” she added.

After leaving MSNBC in 2019, King earned her master’s degree from Kent State University, concentrating on journalism education. That time allowed her to consider how to apply her newsroom skills in the classroom.

“I can [provide] students with my firsthand experience of being in multiple newsrooms for all hours of the day and all days of the week covering a range of stories,” King said. “I’ve experienced firsthand what they’ll be walking into and I hope that my knowledge and skills can be an asset for them—both in learning how to navigate their roles in journalism and introducing them to professional opportunities that can help them develop their own career paths.”

This semester, King is teaching JOUR 494: Navigating the Job Market. She feels that it is the perfect way to begin her career in education and she is excited to equip and prepare students for their own journalism careers.

“It’s incredibly inspiring to be surrounded by student journalists because they have the drive and passion that makes us remember why we got into this business,” King said.

Students can look forward to more Frank Center programming later this spring. Past panel discussions can be viewed on YouTube:

—Story by Faith Lee, Communications Intern. Headshot of Colleen King by Isabella Pennebaker, Photography Intern.

Min’s advocacy for underrepresented groups leads to appointment on President Biden’s Advisory Commission

March 1, 2022 | Vivian La, Communications Intern

Sarah Min (BS ’93, journalism) has always wanted to have a public service chapter of her life. After an extensive career as a media executive, Min now focuses on advocating for people of color and women through nonprofit and political work.

In December, Min was appointed to President Biden’s Advisory Commission on Asian Americans, Native Hawaiians, and Pacific Islanders. The commission will advise the President on issues of equity and inclusion for AANHPI communities, as well as address anti-Asian xenophobia and violence.

“I think we’re in a situation right now where a lot of things in our system are converging to create a climate of hate and polarization,” Min said.

In 2019, she began serving on the board of directors for nonprofits like civil rights advocacy group Color of Change, political action committee EMILY’s List, and engaging with grassroots organizations like the Korean American Community Foundation, with the goal of building civic engagement.

Min saw the power of media in shaping narratives about underrepresented communities.

“Stories—how they’re portrayed and who’s telling them—influence systemic injustice and the biases that we have just as everyday people and consumers of media at scale,” she said.

Min believes it’s important for students to gain real-world media experience as part of their education. In 2020, she established the Daily Illini Journalism Scholarship Fund with her husband Matt Pincus. The fund supports undergraduates in journalism who are committed to working at least one semester at The Daily Illini.

Min said her experiences as a production assistant as well as special projects editor and a reporter for InPrint at The Daily Illini, where she made lifelong friends, were some of her most fun and formative years.

“I’m grateful for that opportunity of being able to learn in an academic setting, but then simultaneously being able to put it into practice,” she said. “[The Daily Illini] was not just a club in the way that we were doing something together, but we also produced something that everybody read every day.”

Min credits the College of Media for facilitating industry connections that launched her career. As a student, Min was drawn to magazine journalism, and was encouraged by journalism mentors Dana Ewell, Jo Thomas, and Bonnie (Bellew) Layton.

“I was fortunate to have mentors who understood the career I wanted, and people who coached me along the way and connected me,” Min said.

Her career began in New York City at Glamour magazine, where she began as an editorial assistant. She held managing editor positions at other magazines including Vibe and Domino, which she helped launch. Min also was president of the publishing company McSweeney’s, founded by fellow journalism alum and author Dave Eggers (BS ’02).

Then, with the rise of digital media and smartphones, Min said “the world changed.” She became executive vice president for marketing and corporate development for ScrollMotion, a mobile enterprise technology company.

Min’s career in for-profit media ended with her time in media consulting, working with companies such as HBO and Penguin Random House.

Min said she recognizes the role that journalism and communications plays in trying to address issues like AANHPI racism.

“I think it’s all our responsibility to be able to tell our own stories, to help other people tell our stories, and to understand our stories,” Min said.

Through the President’s commission, she hopes to bring her professional and personal experience to her role as co-chair of the Data Disaggregation Subcommittee, which will expand the collection and use of disaggregated data at the federal, state, and local levels on AA and NHPI communities, and facilitate improved research on policy and program outcomes for AA and NHPI communities.

“I am honored to be among such a diverse group of leaders who have dedicated much of their lives to improving economic opportunity, environmental health, and equity of AANHPI and all Americans,” she said.

Media students create documentaries for Spurlock Museum exhibit on AIDS tribute

Students interviewing — College of Media students interview Bruce Lang in a studio at Illinois Public Media in Fall 2021. The interview was one of many conducted by Media students as they produced video biographies of the men represented by quilt panels from the "Sewn in Memory" exhibit at Spurlock Museum. (Photo by Professor Charles "Stretch" Ledford.)

Students in journalism and media and cinema studies produced a series of short documentaries chronicling the lives of local men commemorated in AIDS quilt panels, originally made in the 1980s and 1990s for the AIDS Memorial Quilt in Washington, D.C.

The students’ short films are featured in the exhibit “Sewn in Memory: AIDS Quilt Panels from Central Illinois” at the Spurlock Museum of World Cultures in Urbana, on display through July 10, 2022, and can also be watched online.

The videos were created as part of the course JOUR 280: Specialized Skills and Practices, taught in Fall 2021 by Charles “Stretch” Ledford, associate professor of journalism, in collaboration with Kimberlie Kranich, Illinois Public Media’s Director of Community Content & Engagement. In one special video, Stories Untold, the students shared their experiences attempting to find or verify eight of the men.

“It’s important that this project allows people to be exposed to something like this to catalyze deeper exploration,” Ledford said.

“I hope that this project helps to personalize and illuminate a part of our history that’s rarely talked about or taught,” said Owen Henderson, junior in journalism.

Watch a UI-7 Live report on this student project by journalism senior Amanda Brennan:

Students operating cameras — Journalism student Gwyn Skiles adjusts a camera while fellow journalism student Olivia Welshans prepares for an interview in a studio at Illinois Public Media. (Photo by Professor Charles "Stretch" Ledford.)

Additional collaborators for the exhibit include the Greater Community AIDS Project of East Central Illinois, which holds the panels and assisted in exhibit research and creation, and History Harvest, a course at UIUC, which seeks to gather historical stories and documents from local communities.

College of Education and College of Media team up to help Illinois high schoolers understand the media they consume

February 3, 2022 | Tom Hanlon (College of Education) and Holly Rushakoff (College of Media)

A new state law is requiring Illinois public high schools to teach media literacy. Through IMEDIA, the College of Education and the College of Media are helping teachers prepare to do just that.

When Governor J.B. Pritzker signed a bill into law on July 9, 2021, requiring that media literacy be taught in public high schools, Illinois became the first state in the nation to mandate such instruction.

The instruction, to begin with the 2022-2023 school year, will teach students how to analyze and communicate information from various mediums, including digital, interactive, audio, visual, and print.

Immediately after the bill was passed, the College of Education and the College of Media went into action, planning how to prepare Illinois teachers to be ready to instruct students in an area made critical by the massive amount of misinformation that circulates in cyberspace.

The two colleges collaborated to form the Initiative for Media Education Inquiry and Action (IMEDIA) to help fill educators’ needs for media literacy training and curriculum development. The goal of IMEDIA is to assist high school teachers with integrating media analysis and production into their classes and building a robust critical media literacy curriculum in Illinois schools.

“Many of us in the College of Media have been working on media literacy-related research and teaching in the last several years,” said Professor Stephanie Craft, head of the Department of Journalism. “When we heard about the new law, we wanted to be able to turn that work into action. Teaming up with curriculum and instruction experts in the College of Education seemed an ideal way to do that.”

IMEDIA will launch a pilot program on campus from June 27-29, to both find out what teachers are already doing in the area of media literacy and to help them integrate a media literacy component into their curriculum, said Professor Sarah McCarthey, head of the Department of Curriculum & Instruction. The three-day workshop is for local teachers and potentially for teachers across the state.

“Media literacy is especially important in light of the last presidential election and the amount of disinformation and misinformation that is pervasive in the U.S.,” McCarthey said. “It’s more and more critical that we equip students with the ability to discern what’s factual from what’s not.”

“Preparing Illinois students to successfully navigate an increasingly complex media environment is vital to their well-being and ability to participate in democratic life,” Craft added.

The state is putting together media resources for teachers to download, McCarthey said, “but it’s important to have a professional development component to that, and our workshop is going to provide teachers an opportunity to do some hands-on things as well.”

Early talks between the Colleges of Education and Media include the development of modules that high school teachers could download to use in their classrooms.

“We’ve also talked about in the future taking advantage of some of the credentialing programs that are in process at both the campus and state levels,” McCarthey said. “But the first step is to get this group of teachers ready for the fall.”

IMEDIA has recently received initial funding from the Office of the Chancellor. They are consulting with the Office of Foundation Relations to identify additional potential funding sources. The group also hopes to apply for Spencer Foundation funding to do a statewide survey of the media literacy landscape, to discover who is teaching what across the state.

“The end goal is quite simple,” McCarthey said. “We want all of our students to be prepared to be critical media consumers.”

In addition to Craft and McCarthey, members of IMEDIA include College of Education faculty member Jon Hale; College of Media faculty members Amanda Ciafone, CL Cole, and Michelle Nelson, and doctoral student Sakshi Bhalla; as well as Michael Spikes, a doctoral student at Northwestern University and founder of the Illinois Media Literacy Coalition, of which IMEDIA is a part.

Colleen King

Clinical Assistant Professor
Director, Richard and Leslie Frank Center for Leadership and Innovation in Media

Affiliations

Department of Journalism

Background

Colleen King is a clinical assistant professor of journalism and the inaugural director of the Richard and Leslie Frank Center for Leadership and Innovation in Media.

She comes to the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign following 17 years in television news that culminated in her tenure as executive producer of MSNBC’s The 11th Hour with Brian Williams. Under King’s leadership, The 11th Hour became the number one cable news program at 11 p.m., labeled “a success” by The Washington Post and “a must-watch program for political junkies and the Beltway crowd” by The Los Angeles Times.

King also produced MSNBC election programming and breaking news coverage anchored by Williams. She covered live events including the Parkland school shooting, the Trump-Putin summit, testimony by former FBI Directors James Comey and Robert Mueller on Capitol Hill, Supreme Court confirmation hearings, hurricanes, and other breaking news.

King has covered four presidential and five congressional midterm elections. She has booked and produced interviews with presidents, presidential candidates, and top lawmakers. King has also produced live coverage of the Iowa caucuses, New Hampshire primaries, party conventions, and presidential inaugurations.

King began at MSNBC as a booking producer for Hardball with Chris Matthews. There, she secured and produced interviews with top politicians and celebrities including Joe Biden, John McCain, Colin Powell, Sandra Day O’Connor, Robert De Niro, Matt Damon, and Robin Williams.

At MSNBC, she also served as senior producer for Morning Joe, Hardball with Chris Matthews, and other network programming.

King began her television news career at CBS News in Washington. She also worked as an associate producer and booker for the Fox News Channel prior to joining MSNBC.

King received a master’s degree in journalism and mass communication with a concentration in journalism education from Kent State University. She earned her bachelor’s degree in political communication from The George Washington University.

Contact

cck@illinois.edu

Category: Journalism