News 29 | College of Media

Ebert Symposium 2023 to address documentary, violence, and the media

March 1, 2023

This year’s Chaz and Roger Ebert Symposium will feature a film screening, keynote speaker, and two roundtable discussions that address the theme of “Documentary, Violence, and the Media.” The events, which are free and open to the public, are presented by the Roger Ebert Center for Film Studies.

Chaz Ebert’s beloved grandson, Joseph London Smith, was tragically and unintendedly the victim of gun violence in Atlanta, Georgia, in September 2022. In dedication to his memory, the Ebert Symposium will explore the power of cinema to mediate violence and ask: How does cinema intervene in this conversation?

PROGRAM

TUESDAY, APRIL 18

7:30-9 p.m.
Knight Auditorium, Spurlock Museum, 600 S. Gregory, Urbana

Screening of Symbiopsychotaxiplasm: Take One
Symbiopsychotaxiplasm: Take One (1968) is an experimental documentary by Black Emmy award-winning filmmaker William Greaves that was selected by the Library of Congress for preservation in the National Film Registry in 2015. Ebert Symposium keynote speaker Amir George, artistic director of Kartemquin Films, selected the film and will share introductory remarks. Learn more.

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 19

9:30 a.m.-2:30 p.m.
Illini Room C, Illini Union, 1401 W. Green, Urbana

Keynote Speaker
9:30–10:45 a.m.
“To Be Radical”
Amir George, Artistic Director, Kartemquin Films, Chicago
Join us in person or register to join via Zoom.

Roundtable Discussion #1
11:30 a.m.–12:30 p.m.
“Cinema and Media Interventions into Violence”

Panelists:

Rachel Kuo, Assistant Professor of Media & Cinema Studies, UIUC
Denise Zaccardi, Executive Director and Founder of CTVN, Community TV Network, Chicago
Melita Garza, Associate Professor and Tom and June Netzel Sleeman Scholar in Business Journalism, UIUC
Moderated by Angela Aguayo, Associate Professor of Media & Cinema Studies, UIUC

Roundtable Discussion #2
1-2:30 p.m.
“Cinema and Violence in Challenging Times”

Panelists include the following Ebertfest 2023 filmmaker guests:

Edson Oda, director of Nine Days (2020)
Jason Michael Berman, producer of Nine Days and president of Mandalay Pictures
Max Libman, teenage founder and director of CU International Film Festival, Champaign-Urbana
Brenda Robinson, producer of Marian Anderson: The Whole World in Her Hands (2022)
Moderated by Jenny Oyallon-Koloski, Assistant Professor of Media & Cinema Studies, UIUC

KEYNOTE SPEAKER

Amir George, Artistic Director of Kartemquin Films

Amir George is an award-winning filmmaker and has served as a programmer at True/False Film Fest and Chicago International Film Festival. As an artist, George creates spiritual stories, juxtaposing sound and image into an experience of non-linear perception. George’s films have screened at institutions and film festivals including Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, Institute of Contemporary Arts, London, Anthology Film Archives, Glasgow School of Art, Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, Ann Arbor Film Festival, Trinidad and Tobago International Film Festival, BlackStar Film Festival, and Camden International Film Festival, among others.

The Ebert Symposium began in 2018 and is named in part for the late film critic Roger Ebert. Ebert, who died in 2013, was an Urbana native, journalism alumnus, Pulitzer Prize-winning film critic for the Chicago Sun-Times, and founder of RogerEbert.com. His namesake film festival, known as Ebertfest, runs April 19-22 at the Virginia Theatre in downtown Champaign.

PANELISTS

Rachel Kuo, Assistant Professor of Media & Cinema Studies in the College of Media, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign

Dr. Rachel Kuo writes, teaches, and researches race, social movements, and technology. Her current book manuscript, Movement Media: Racial Solidarities Across Platforms, brings together archival research and ethnographic fieldwork to examine historical and contemporary grassroots organizing and social movement media forms addressing state violence and U.S. democracy. Her new work examines transnational and intergenerational information systems in Asian diasporas and histories of mis- and disinformation. Her writing has been published in New Media & Society, Social Media and Society, Journal of Communication, Teen Vogue, Truth Out, and ACM Interactions.

She is a founding member and current affiliate of the Center for Critical Race and Digital Studies and also a co-founder of the Asian American Feminist Collective. She is a co-editor of the anthology Black and Asian Feminist Solidarities with Haymarket Books and co-editor of the the book series Critical Race + Digital Studies at New York University Press. She is also a guest editor at the Asian American Writers’ Workshop, including the World Without Cages project.

Denise Zaccardi, Executive director and founder of CTVN, Community TV Network, Chicago

Denise Zaccardi, executive director and CTVN founder, holds a PhD in Communications from The Union Institute and wrote the nation’s first dissertation on media arts curriculum for low-income, minority youth. She earned an M.S. in Early Childhood Education from State College in Buffalo, and a B.A. in Psychology from the University of Dayton. She has participated as a media and education activist with a variety of local and national organizations. Dr. Zaccardi has received numerous awards for her contributions to the field, including the Christian Service Award from the University of Dayton, and the Service Recognition Award for Arts Educator from the Illinois Arts Alliance. Dr. Zaccardi has put together a team of seasoned artist/teachers carefully selected not only for their exceptional ability to engage and teach arts underserved youth; but to represent a broad range of vital skills and knowledge including psychology, marketing, organizational dynamics, writing, audio, editing, producing, directing, graphics, and animation.

Community TV Network (CTVN) is a non-profit company devoted to empowering youth with the resources and education they need to make digital media! Our network of artists, teachers, and alumni has been promoting the visions and voices of Chicago’s students for 49 years. CTVN promotes positive youth and community development with the overall goal of raising the educational success and economic viability of the neighborhoods in which young participants live and work. CTVN programs instill in our students the awareness, motivation, and tools they need to create positive futures for themselves and the people around them.

Melita Garza, Associate Professor and Tom and June Netzel Sleeman Scholar in Business Journalism in the College of Media, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign

Melita M. Garza is an associate professor and the Tom and June Netzel Sleeman Scholar in Business Journalism in the Department of Journalism. She is the 2022-2023 Chair of the Standing Committee on Research for the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication. She was a fellow at the Donald W. Reynolds National Center for Business Journalism. Prior to getting her PhD, Melita M. Garza was an award-winning journalist, working at the Chicago Tribune, Bloomberg news, and the Los Angeles Times during a two-decade-long career.

She is an American journalism historian who studies news as an agent of democracy, specializing in English- and Spanish-language news, the immigrant press, and coverage of underrepresented groups. She is the lead editor of a forthcoming book that aims to re-envision the history of journalism. She is the author of They Came to Toil: Newspaper Representations of Mexicans and Immigrants in the Great Depression (Austin: University of Texas Press, 2018), which was a finalist for the Tankard Book Award, the Frank Luther Mot/ Kappa Tau Alpha Award, and the National Association of Chicana and Chicano Studies (NACCS) Tejas Fojo Award. Her research has also won awards from the American Journalism Historians Association (AJHA), and the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication (AEJMC) divisions of: History, Minorities and Communication, and International Communication.

MODERATOR: Angela Aguayo, Associate Professor of Media & Cinema Studies, UIUC

Angela Aguayo’s research is centered around documentary production and media studies, and her work creates connections between production, theory, and history. She was selected as a James W. Carey Faculty Fellow, for which she will work on a book project called Collective Matters, which examines how traditions in the humanities, health care, law, and education manifest through documentary in non-theatrical spaces, addressing the rituals of media producing, screening, and circulating that bind communities across time. Her project called the Illinois Community Media Project—which focuses on people making and circulating media that is most aligned with the interests of that community—received funding from campus’s inaugural Call to Action to Address Racism & Social Injustice Research Program. She has previously published Documentary Resistance: Social Change and Participatory Media (Oxford University Press), which explores a documentary’s capacity for social change.

Edson Oda, Director

After a series of award-winning short films and music videos, Japanese Brazilian writer and director Edson Oda made his film directorial debut with Nine Days (2020). Based in Los Angeles, Oda is a BAFTA Breakthrough alum, a Sundance Screenwriters Lab alum, and a Latin Grammy-nominated director for best music video.

Jason Michael Berman, Producer, President of Mandalay Pictures

Jason Michael Berman, president of Mandalay Pictures, was named in the 2016 Variety Dealmakers Impact Report, and in Variety in 2011 as one of the Top Ten Producers to Watch.

Berman currently has AIR in release for Amazon and Skydance, directed by Ben Affleck, written by Alex Convery, and starring Matt Damon, Ben Affleck, Viola Davis, and Jason Bateman.

He recently produced Surrounded, directed by Anthony Mandler and starring Letitia Wright, Jamie Bell, and Michael K. William, awaiting release from MGM/Amazon. His other recent producing credits include Edson Oda’s Sundance award-winning film Nine Days; Olivier Megaton’s The Last Days of American Crime; Prentice Penny’s Uncorked; Cindy Chupack’s Otherhood; Clark Johnson’s Juanita; Jonathan Helpert’s IO; Gerard McMurray’s Burning Sands; Ryan Koo’s Amateur; Eli Craig’s Little Evil; and Nate Parker’s 2016 Sundance Film Festival Grand Jury and Audience Award-winning film The Birth of a Nation.

Berman is in development on new projects for Skydance, Netflix, Sony, Apple, and A24.

Prior to producing, Berman worked at the William Morris Agency, MGM Studios, and for writer/director Gary Ross. Berman is a member of the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences, and the Producers Guild of America. He is a 2006 graduate of the University of Southern California, School of Cinematic Arts, where he has been an adjunct professor since 2013. Berman helped to develop and start the Catalyst program at the Sundance Institute which has now raised over $50M for the financing of award-winning independent narrative film and documentary projects. He is originally from Baltimore, Maryland.

Max Libman, CU International Film Festival Founder

Max Libman is the teenage founder and director of the CU International Film Festival that debuted in October in Urbana and featured eight short films, one of which was produced by the Turner brothers. In his young career, Libman has also been honored for his screenwriting.

Brenda Robinson, Producer

Brenda Robinson, producer and entertainment attorney, is involved with numerous film, television, and music projects. She is a producer of Marian Anderson: The Whole World in Her Hands (2022), and was a financier on the Academy Award-winning documentary Icarus as well as Won’t You Be My Neighbor and Step. Robinson is currently head of film finance and inclusion strategies for HiddenLight Productions, a global studio founded by Hillary Clinton, Sam Branson, and Chelsea Clinton. She is also a member of Impact Partners, which is dedicated to funding independent documentaries that focus on social issues.

MODERATOR: Jenny Oyallon-Koloski, Assistant Professor of Media & Cinema Studies

Jenny Oyallon-Koloski is an assistant professor of Media & Cinema Studies at the University of Illinois Urbana–Champaign and a Certified Movement Analyst in Laban/Bartenieff Movement Studies. She serves as the movement analysis specialist for the Media Ecology Project (Mark Williams and John P. Bell, PIs, Dartmouth College) and is a faculty affiliate of the Eye Tracking / Physiology Lab in the College of Media at the University of Illinois. Her current book project argues for the storytelling power of figure movement and dance in musical cinema. She is also the director of the movement visualization (mv) lab and co-creator, in collaboration with Michael Junokas, of the mv tool, an embodied motion-capture research environment to study the manifestations of human movement in cinematic space.

Alumna Karen Petitte’s distinguished career advances gender equality in journalism

February 27, 2023 | Kelly Youngblood

University of Illinois alumna Karen Lucas Petitte pursued a career in journalism at a time when barriers were common for women, and opportunities were few. But that didn’t stop the visionary trailblazer from building an illustrious career as an award-winning journalist—and helping to advance gender equality in journalism along the way.

Petitte’s inspiration to become a journalist came from an unlikely source—the newspaper comic strip, Brenda Starr, Reporter. Petitte loved following the adventures of chic, newspaper reporter Brenda Starr, who traveled around the globe breaking stories (and, probably, just as many hearts).

“She was quite glamorous, and I think at some point she met some dashing guy with a patch over his eye, and I thought, ‘Oh, I want to do that. That sounds great,’” Petitte said.

Petitte, who earned two journalism degrees at Illinois (BS ’63, MS ’67), would eventually become a newspaper reporter like the comic book heroine. But it’s the comic’s creator, Dale Messick, whom she would truly come to emulate.

Dalia Messick, who used the pseudonym Dale Messick to avoid gender bias, was a rarity in those days as a female cartoonist. Like Messick, Petitte would forge her own path through a male-dominant field, opening doors for more women.

After graduation, Petitte worked briefly at the Chicago Tribune and then joined the Chicago Daily News in 1968, assigned to an education beat. Originally, she had applied for an overnight reporter shift at the Chicago Daily News but was told it was “too dangerous” for women.

Although education was traditionally considered a “woman’s beat,” she was happy for the opportunity to break into the newsroom. In 1973, Petitte and a colleague won first prize from the National Council for the Advancement of Education Writing for an investigative piece on financial misconduct at Malcolm X College in Chicago.

“It was kind of inspiring to be able to report on some of those activities, trying to bring to light things that many people would just as soon have kept in the dark,” Petitte said.

After an initial focus on education, and later, consumer affairs, Petitte would go on to cover a variety of news stories including disasters, fires, and gender equality issues. She covered a protest at a local Chicago restaurant that had a men’s-only bar area and wrote about the discrepancies in men’s and women’s salaries.

Eventually, Petitte was offered a position as assistant city editor at the Chicago Daily News—the first woman to ever be considered—and although she preferred reporting, she knew she couldn’t refuse.

“I didn’t really want to be an assistant city editor at the time; I like to report. But I figured, maybe I better do this, because if we [as women] keep asking for these jobs, and then we don’t take them, they’re not going to take us seriously,” Petitte said.

In 1979, Petitte took a brief detour from journalism and tried government. She spent over three years working as Chicago’s consumer affairs commissioner under Mayor Jane Byrne—the first woman to be elected mayor of a major city in the United States. That appointment enabled Petitte to help enforce consumer regulations as opposed to writing about them.

When Byrne’s term ended, Petitte considered going into public relations but ultimately decided to return to journalism, this time entering the magazine field. Petitte worked as editor of Consumers Digest and then Modern Healthcare and Modern Physician, published by Chicago-based media company, Crain Communications. Petitte stayed with Crain Communications for 16 years before retiring in 2001.

Petitte’s 40-plus-year journalism career is comprised of prestigious honors, including the first female president of the Chicago Newspaper Guild, an inductee into the Chicago Journalism Hall of Fame, and among the first women to serve as editor-in-chief of The Daily Illini from 1962 to 1963.

Petitte, who was inducted into the Illini Media Hall of Fame in 2007, has fond memories of her time at the student newspaper, including working alongside the late film critic Roger Ebert (BS ’64, journalism), whom she recalls as “quite a character” and a “very smart, capable, witty guy.” And because she worked evenings at The Daily Illini, she was provided a key to get into her dorm room after the University’s curfew for women—a perk Petitte valued, knowing she had the freedom to choose her own schedule.

In the latter part of her career, Petitte was able to mentor younger writers, sharing the skills she’d learned over her many years of reporting. She said that helping young people move along in their career was something she enjoyed more than she expected.

Ten years ago, Petitte found another way to bring along the next generation of journalists by creating the Karen Lucas Petitte Endowed Scholarship in Journalism.

“It just seemed to me a good way to pay back the college for the education that I received, and the knowledge that allowed me to go on and build a career that was very satisfying and rewarding and fun,” Petitte said.

The endowed scholarship, created in 2003, is based on academic merit and financial need, and has created an impact and connection with students that Petitte finds extremely rewarding.

Petitte has met a few of the scholarship winners and has received many thank-you letters—reminders that she’s still helping to pave the way for future journalists, even in her retirement.

Petitte said she has seen a gradual shift over the years, with more opportunities available for women in journalism. While she’s hesitant to take too much credit for that progress, she is grateful to have had any impact at all.

“It’s a good feeling to know that you helped change some of the patterns, and that there’s some women who came behind you who have some more opportunity,” Petitte said. “I think that’s what it’s all about.”

Geography, language dictate social media and popular website usage, study finds

February 9, 2023 | Lois Yoksoulian, University of Illinois News Bureau

Since its inception, the Internet has been viewed by technology experts and scholars as a way to access information at a global scale without having to overcome hurdles posed by language and geography. However, researchers at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign found that how people around the world use the same popular social media platforms and websites remains vastly different based on their language and geography.

A new study by Harsh Taneja, associate professor of new and emerging media in the Charles H. Sandage Department of Advertising, and Margaret Yee Man Ng, assistant professor of journalism, builds upon previous research and examines Internet consumption across 124 countries through their usage of popular websites, as well as Twitter and YouTube—two globally dominant social media platforms.

The results of the new study are published in the journal PLOS ONE.

“The goal of this work was to develop ways to assess which countries are most like each other in the usage of these popular websites and social media platforms and to identify factors that explain the similarities,” the researchers said.

The team found that language and geography remain the most salient predictors of web usage, and their role on YouTube and Twitter is just as significant as on the wider web.

“This is true of the websites they visit and also how they use social media,” Taneja said. “Sure, YouTube is the most popular online outlet in most of the world, but people in Nepal on average do not watch the same videos as people in the United States.”

The team collected and compared trending Internet traffic data and the use of hashtags for the two most popular social media platforms—Twitter and YouTube—and the 500 most-visited sites using Alexa’s Global Rank in the 124 nations studied.

“We chose to work with Twitter and YouTube because although they are both very popular, they attract different audiences, so they capture a very wide slice of Internet use,” the researchers said.

“Our analysis suggests that global web use is quite heterogeneous, whether it is website traffic or in how people use Twitter or YouTube, with social media usage being even less similar overall than the usage of websites,” Ng said.

Previous studies have shown that the free exchange of information has been hampered by government regulations and protections in nations like Russia and China, for example.

“However, government regulation is not the only reason for the restrained flow of information,” Taneja said. “Our study offers empirical evidence that people generally prefer content that focuses on their region and in their language.”

While using data reflecting trending YouTube videos and Twitter topics via hashtags may not wholly capture Internet consumption numbers, it works well as a proxy to gauge consumption on these platforms, the researchers said.

“An important caveat of this work is that we must acknowledge that trending topics are not purely based on consumption,” Ng said. “There is some sort of a black box that determines the complete picture, but tracking hashtags is an effective proxy and less biased than methods involving geolocation, for example, because many users do not reveal their location while browsing.”

Taneja and Ng said the study is beneficial to researchers studying the global flow of information—and, importantly, misinformation—and for web content producers interested in gaining a larger or more targeted global audience.

Seed funding from the Center for Social and Behavioral Science at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign supported this study.

Editor’s notes:

To reach Harsh Taneja, email harsht@illinois.edu.

To reach Margaret Yee Man Ng, email ymn@illinois.edu.

The paper “Web use remains highly regional even in the age of global platform monopolies” is available online and from the U of I News Bureau. DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0278594

View original press release.

JR Reed joins College of Media Office of Advancement

February 1, 2023 | Kelly Youngblood

JR Reed considers himself a lifelong learner who enjoys meeting new people and exploring new places—just a few of the many qualities that will serve him well in his new role as assistant director of advancement at the College of Media.

Reed, who officially began in January, is bringing a wealth of experience and a variety of interests, as well as a lot of drive and ambition, to the fundraising position.

For Deanne Johnson, assistant dean for advancement at the College of Media, those were some of the key reasons she felt Reed would be a great addition to the team.

“His compassion for others and positive outlook on life were obvious from our first meeting,” Johnson said. “He brings a diverse set of skills to the position, and we are fortunate to have him on our Advancement team and in the College of Media.”

Reed said the major gift officer role initially appealed to him because he felt it offered the ability to connect with alumni and donors, hear their stories, and help them find ways to support the college. He knew the job would be a perfect match after meeting with members of the College of Media.

“Not only did the job description match [my skills and interests] but I really connected with the team here. Everyone I’ve met has been friendly and welcoming, so it just felt right.” he said.

He recognizes the importance of media and the role it plays in various aspects of today’s world—media is “very cutting-edge, always adapting, and impactful to people’s lives.”

A native of Tolono, Illinois, Reed grew up an Illini fan, frequently attending Illinois football and basketball games.

“The University was always a big part of my life growing up. I was born and bred orange and blue,” he said. “It makes sense my professional trajectory would bring me back to the area, working for the University.”

The career path leading Reed to Illinois has been a winding one which includes culinary school, a bachelor’s in business administration from Robert Morris University in Chicago, an infantry squad leader in the U.S. Army, a barber’s license, and an MBA from California Coast University. Most recently, he worked as a membership and marketing supervisor at Costco Wholesale in Champaign. Reed believes his vast experiences have prepared him for the role he’s in today.

Reed says the most valuable lesson he’s learned working at Costco and serving in the U.S. Army was the importance of taking care of people and finding solutions—whether it was soldiers, customers, or the 50-plus employees he managed. He feels it will transfer well to his advancement position.

Reed has also worked at two famous downtown Chicago attractions including the Skydeck at Willis Tower and the Chicago River Boat Architecture Tours. These experiences, coupled with organizing off-site networking events for Costco, has helped to foster his event-planning skills, which he will use in his new position as he supports Chicago-based, alumni-coordinated events.

He anticipates his first year to be full of learning experiences, and he’s looking forward to integrating into the advancement team and engaging with alumni and donors.

“Maybe it’s a scholarship or a deferred gift—everybody is going to have a different story and something different they want to support. That’s where I come in, as a liaison, to assure their needs are met to support the University of Illinois and the College of Media,” Reed said.

“Perhaps the most fulfilling part of the job, and a component I will enjoy the most, is the positive impact on the lives and futures of students, faculty, and staff,” he added. “Each generous gift to the College of Media has the potential to positively transform the academic career of our students. Only rarely do we have the ability and opportunity to make such impacts, and I’m privileged to say I now have the potential to do so.”

2022 College of Media Teaching Award recipients announced

January 20, 2023

Each academic year, the College of Media seeks nominations for a teaching award that honors faculty who display a strong commitment to the undergraduate teaching mission. This year, Josh Heuman and Yiran Gao have been recognized as recipients of the 2022 College of Media Teaching Awards.

Heuman, a teaching assistant professor in the Department of Media & Cinema Studies and the Department of Journalism, received the Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching by a Specialized Faculty Member. Heuman’s teachings range widely across the field of media studies, including courses in media industries, media law, media history, media theory, and media genre, narrative, and style. His research explores media industries and regulation, especially in television, with an emphasis on the regulation of media work. He’s also interested in the evolution of the television writers’ room where stories are first introduced.

Gao, a doctoral student at the Institute of Communications Research, received the Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching by a Teaching Assistant. Since Spring 2018, Gao has consistently been ranked as excellent by her students, based on Instructor and Course Evaluation System (ICES) questionnaire forms. Her interdisciplinary research interests lie at the intersection of media studies, critical cultural studies, science and technology studies, and global studies. Her current research focuses on the roles and the impact of digital media on the formation of digital public sphere at a transnational level.

AAF selects seven students for diversity, equity, and inclusion program

January 19, 2023

Seven seniors in the University of Illinois chapter of the American Advertising Federation were named to the American Advertising Federation’s Most Promising Multicultural Students Class of 2023—an honor given to only 50 students each year throughout the United States. Honorees include advertising majors Julie Garcia, Asia Griffin, Carmen Larios, Kassandra Leyva, Blake Morrow, and Marvin Sosa, and chemistry major Juan Camargo Quintero.

In 1997, the American Advertising Federation created the Most Promising Multicultural Students program to connect the advertising industry with the nation’s top multicultural college students. Since the program’s inception, the AAF Illinois chapter has had more winners than any other university or college.

Recognizing the top 50 multicultural college seniors across the nation, the Most Promising program promotes diversity, equity, and inclusion within the advertising industry, giving advertising, media, communications, and tech companies the opportunity to tap into high-achieving talent of diverse college students from across the country.

Each year, students of racial or ethnic diversity from the AAF’s 140+ college chapters apply to the program. Advertising leaders select the highest-achieving diverse seniors to participate.

In February, the winning students will participate in a four-day industry immersion program in New York City with the highest-level industry executives and companies that includes professional development and personal branding workshops. They will also be recognized at the annual Building Bridges for Our Future awards luncheon.

The event serves as a recruiting opportunity for industry leaders to develop a diverse group, representing the best from the country to serve as the next generation of advertising leaders. It also offers students invaluable network, learning, and immersion experiences with professionals from top advertisers, media companies, and advertising agencies.

Award-winning journalism alumna Kalodimos releases true crime podcast

Award-winning alumna Demetria Kalodimos (MS ’83, journalism) has released a nine-part true crime podcast about a 1975 cold case murder.

Carol’s Last Christmas examines the murder of Carol Rofstad at Illinois State University in 1975. The podcast, which was produced by Kalodimos’ company, Genuine Human Productions, is the culmination of a two-year investigation with Alexandra Daskalopoulos, a journalist and legal researcher, and George Seibel, a retired Chicago police officer who founded the Institute for Cold Case Solutions at Morton College.

Kalodimos, who was named Tennessee Broadcaster of the Year in 1995 and inducted into the Tennessee Journalism Hall of Fame in 2016, was a television news anchor at WICD Channel 15 in Champaign before her 34-year career as principal anchor and investigative reporter at WSMV-TV Nashville.

In addition to podcast, documentary, and music video production, she is currently executive producer of the non-profit, web-based Nashville Banner, a locally owned, civic news organization.

Kalodimos has anchored and reported the news for more than 40 years and has won some of the top awards in broadcast journalism including 16 Emmys, three Investigative Reporters and Editors national awards, and three Edward R. Murrow Awards for investigative reporting. She was named 2021 Professional in Residence at Lipscomb University School of Communication.

Advertising alum Mike Wychocki credits college leadership and faculty for career inspirations

January 10, 2023 | Kelly Youngblood

Mike Wychocki with advertising students — In Fall 2022, Mike Wychocki (center) was invited back to campus by the College of Media to explain to students in the American Advertising Federation RSO how he developed the new branding and marketing campaigns for EagleRail.

Since Mike Wychocki (BS ’83, advertising) graduated from the University of Illinois College of Media nearly 40 years ago, he has helped build and sell two advertising/marketing agencies, traveled around the world, and become Chief Marketing Officer of a global container-shipping transportation company.

In all that time, Wychocki has never forgotten a certain College of Media associate dean and a professor, both of whom played a vital role in his education and professional success.

“One of the things that keeps me connected to the University of Illinois and the College of Media is, at the time, we had a Dean of Students named William Alfeld. He helped me get across the finish line,” Wychocki said. “I think if it weren’t for Dean Alfeld, I probably wouldn’t have graduated.

“Dean Alfeld was one of those kind gentlemen who had a big heart. He would always help me figure something out,” Wychocki said of the late Alfeld, who served as associate dean at the college from 1962 to 1992.

Wychocki, a first-generation college student from the south side of Chicago, was unfamiliar with the collegiate lifestyle and overwhelmed upon his arrival.

He initially struggled with academics and didn’t care for the large lecture-type classes held in huge auditoriums. Thankfully, Alfeld helped him navigate the challenge of introductory courses, and helped identify the strengths and talents that enabled him to thrive in the major.

Wychocki also recalls an advertising professor who had a profound impact on his career—the late Gordon White, who Wychocki describes as “the second most influential person” he encountered as a student on campus. White, who taught classes in advertising creative strategy, also earned his MS and PhD degrees in the college.

“[Professor White] taught me a lot and was very supportive of me. He gave me the confidence to know that I was a good storyteller. And I believe that all advertising starts with a good story,” he said.

“Taking several journalism classes also helped and Professor White explaining how to craft and express a strong message definitely kept me inspired in my career over the years,” Wychocki added. “Plus, Professor White was an actual Mad Men Creative Director at BBDO on Madison Avenue in NYC in the 1960s and he taught us how the U.S. ad market transited from long-format ads in the 1950s to short, clever, and pithy ads just like Don Draper reminded us 30 years later.”

Wychocki also has fond memories of his time working at WILL-TV as a production assistant, production manager, and assistant producer. He said engaging in hands-on learning at WILL was a pivotal decision that helped guide him to choose a path in marketing and advertising.

The advertising education he received at Illinois has enabled him to create numerous career opportunities, including his current role as CMO of EagleRail. About seven years ago, Wychocki started out as a freelance marketing consultant for EagleRail, a global transportation solution that automates short-haul container shuttling between ports and intermodal facilities.

Wychocki describes the company concept as “doing with a 60,000-pound box what Amazon warehouses do with a 60-pound box. Robotically lift it, shuttle it, and set it back down in the right spot.” He developed that elevator pitch seven years ago, and still uses it today.

After just a few months of joining the company, Wychocki purchased majority interest of EagleRail from the company’s inventor and took the lead as Chairman and Chief Executive Officer. More recently, he decided to focus on the marketing and sales side of the business and hired his own replacement.

“I always knew my job here was to sell this concept—create this story from the whole cloth. I recently hired my own replacement with international operational and global finance experience and gave myself the title of Chief Marketing Officer,” he said.

No matter how far his career has taken him away from the University of Illinois campus, he will always recall the unique places and traditions that students still enjoy today, such has hanging out on the Quad and “geeking out” to the Marching Illini band perform at sporting events.

If he had any career advice to give current advertising students, Wychocki says it would be to work hard to create, cultivate, and value professional relationships. While a good strategy and creative execution are important, nothing helps you succeed long-term like creating a personal connection with the people you’re working with, whether it’s a client or a colleague.

“I’m a huge believer in positive relationships as currency. I think it is one of the keys to success,” he said. “You have three elements in life that will determine the level you achieve professionally: how smart you are, how hard you work, and how well you work with other people. If you’ve got two out of three, you’ll be a success…and working well with others is the lowest investment and highest return of the three.”

Wychocki also recommends being yourself and understanding your own strengths first.

“If you know what your brand is and know what your strengths are, then you’ll know how to position yourself either for jobs or accounts or freelance opportunities that are right for you,” he said. “Be yourself and find out what your internal brand is. If you want to figure out how to create someone else’s brand, first you’ve got to figure out your brand, and then you’ll be in the best position to succeed.”

Brand Ambassador Program develops students’ brand management skills to benefit Illini athletes, community

January 9, 2023 | Kelly Youngblood and Vivian La, Communications Intern

(Photos by Isabella Pennebaker, photography intern.)

The first cohort of students in the Brand Ambassador Program are halfway through their yearlong experience, which pairs a student interested in social media and brand management with Fighting Illini student-athletes and local organizations.

Since its inception just four months ago, the program is already making a positive impact for student ambassadors, student-athletes, and the community at large.

“I think it’s been incredibly successful on both ends,” said Carrie Wilson-Brown, lecturer in media and cinema studies and advertising, and a faculty lead for the program (pictured at right). “I know the athletes are really excited to have our student ambassadors give as much input as possible into their feeds and I know the ambassadors are really thrilled with that kind of hands-on experience.”

The purpose of the program is to offer students experiential learning to enhance their social media management skills and to help student-athletes develop their brand. It also focuses on aiding local organizations with digital promotion.

“It really is a great partnership between community members, and also gives our students a range of experiences in real-world circumstances,” said Wilson-Brown.

The inaugural program, which first kicked off in August, is one of the latest initiatives of the Hub for Brand Innovation and Advertising Technology and the Charles H. Sandage Department of Advertising.

With a mission to educate students about the most current advertising trends and to provide them with leading-edge experiences that go beyond classroom theory, both the Sandage Department of Advertising and the Brand Hub are shaping the field of strategic brand communication.

“The Brand Ambassador Program is another novel professional development opportunity for advertising students that the Brand Hub has coordinated,” said Professor Mike Yao, head of the Sandage Department of Advertising. “We are proud to foster this collaboration. Students are applying the advertising, branding, and social media strategy skills that they’ve acquired through our curriculum, and through their own experiences, to support the success of their peers and the local community.”

Nearly all of the 20 student ambassadors are advertising majors. Some ambassadors have paired up with local organizations such as Visit Champaign County to help highlight local events and businesses with their own robust social media following. Most are working with Fighting Illini student-athletes to strategize and create content for their social media.

The Brand Ambassador Program helps student-athletes address last year’s changes to the NCAA Name, Image, and Likeness (NIL) policy, which now allows all NCAA D1, D2, and D3 student-athletes to be compensated for their name, image, and likeness, regardless of whether their state has NIL laws in place.

Wilson-Brown said the updated NIL policy has created an incentive for student-athletes to enhance their brand and increase their social media presence. As a result, student-athletes recognize the importance of a digital persona and a professionally curated social media feed.

“The ambassador program is an opportunity to use the talents of students and faculty to help athletes sculpt a brand for themselves online and hopefully to monetize themselves with local and national sponsorships as well,” she added.

Wilson-Brown noted the students are ambassadors, not agents, and do not directly facilitate any sponsorship deals or monetary contracts.

The Brand Ambassador Program operates in conjunction with the INFLUENCE program, which was launched by the University of Illinois Division of Intercollegiate Athletics last year. INFLUENCE is an educational approach to the monetization of an athlete’s name, image and likeness that emphasizes brand and strategy development along with business and financial concepts. INFLUENCE is powered by NIL sports technology company Opendorse, which features all Fighting Illini athletes within its athlete endorsement website.

Kaylee Patthana, a junior majoring in advertising, is working with Illini women’s volleyball player Kennedy Collins to help promote her personal brand. Patthana said she and Collins have discussed ways she can expand her brand to include not only her college athletic persona but also her personal interests such as fashion and lifestyle aesthetics.

Patthana says that the close-knit nature of the ambassador group is her favorite aspect of the program: “I love that in this program I have a network of people around me that I can talk to and work with who also love to do what I do,” she said.

Jack Struthers (pictured at top), a senior in advertising working with an Illini soccer player, said the ambassador program is mutually beneficial for Media students who want real-world experience and athletes looking to expand their brands.

Struthers said managing a social media presence as a student-athlete can be overwhelming and this partnership can help address some of those challenges.

“Getting paired with an ambassador from the College of Media who kind of understands how the [sports endorsement] ecosystem works and understands how [social media] works and can inject content—I think it’s extremely powerful,” he said.

Emily Gonzalez is a senior in advertising working with an Illini women’s basketball player. Through this partnership, Gonzalez gets to share her expertise on social media trends to help create relevant content, such as a “day in the life” video.

“It’s all about the analytical side of things and just trying to communicate possible trends that are taking off,” said Gonzalez, who is now considering a career path in social media management.

Brand Ambassadors meet monthly with Wilson-Brown to update their progress, reporting about post content and analytics. After a semester of guiding brand ambassadors, Wilson-Brown said she’s excited to expand the program, whether that’s adding more students, more athletes, or more partnering organizations.

“I find students have a much more nuanced understanding of how to use these digital tools every day and so we’re able to collaborate really beautifully on that and I think that’s really humbling,” she said. “It’s a really great learning opportunity that we have in the Advertising department.”

New journalism master’s degree track focusing on science and technology receives campus funding

With a significant need for professionals to communicate science, discoveries, and innovations to the general public, a flexible hybrid/online program—with a focus on science and technology—will be offered through the journalism master’s degree beginning Fall 2023.

Students can earn the Master of Science in Journalism degree with a focus on science and technology journalism entirely online in as few as two semesters full-time or can tailor a part-time schedule over additional semesters. Students also may opt to take courses that “stack” to a professional credential, and those courses can later be applied to a degree.

The new program is a collaboration between the College of Media and the Carl R. Woese Institute for Genomic Biology and was one of 10 projects selected this year to be funded by campus’s Investment for Growth program, to enhance the visibility and impact of the University of Illinois.

“The Department of Journalism is proud to expand our curricula to train current and future journalists how to communicate important scientific and technical information to the general public,” said Mira Sotirovic, head of the Department of Journalism and associate professor and Karin and Folke Dovring Scholar in Propaganda. “We have seen a growing interest in, and a growing need for, science communication and are thrilled to receive Investment for Growth funding to begin meeting the demand.”

The new curricula will also offer a science and technology communication certificate for undergraduates, and the online 400-level courses in this track will expand paths to degree completion for undergraduates.

“Scientific research and innovation are present in our daily lives, in seen and unseen ways,” said Claudia Lutz, outreach manager at the Institute for Genomic Biology. “As the last few years have reminded us, this is particularly true of the field of genomics, which intersects with almost every aspect of both life sciences and society. We are excited to help give future science journalists an inside look at how science is done and a broader awareness of its impact.”

The timing of this program coincides with needs voiced by the science communication industry for such training, especially since the COVID-19 pandemic, but also to report on critical stories of our time including climate change, nuclear and chemical warfare, and health and wellness. For example, Scientific American published “How the Pandemic Remade Science Journalism,” (2022), NiemanLab reported on “Reporting That Hits Home: Covering Science for Local Audiences” (2022), and the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences covered “Science Audiences, Misinformation, and Fake News” (2019).

The online master’s program and individual course modules are ideal for journalists and prospective journalists who want to improve and specialize in science writing or to gain a competitive advantage in the field; scientists and their academic colleagues who wish to be more effective in communicating to lay audiences; and communications professionals who work for nonprofits, government agencies, or science- or technology-focused corporations who are interested in boosting their skills and understanding.

Courses will cover writing science stories in plain English; the basics of data journalism, including building databases and analyzing data; visualization in newsrooms; humanizing data through video storytelling and humanizing science communication by harnessing virtual reality; and more. Students will also examine the science of genomics and its applications to environment, health, and technology through course modules. See a sample course sequence for the master’s degree and sample course modules.

As part of the preparation for enrolling students next fall, the Department of Journalism is hiring a new professor in science, technology, data, or digital journalism to supplement the course offerings.

“They will have an important role in the new concentration,” Sotirovic said. “The new faculty member will teach courses in science journalism, as well as some combination of courses in data journalism, social media analytics, and other courses based on their own expertise and interests.”

Additionally, the Institute for Genomic Biology is hiring a postdoctoral fellow in science communications curriculum coordination. This position will help develop course materials and oversee experiential learning for students in the program.

Learn more about the program and the application details. The deadline to apply is March 3, 2023.

For more information about this program, please email Mira Sotirovic.

—Holly Rushakoff