Welcome to the 2009-2010 year at the SIUC School of Journalism. During the past year, the School has worked on revising and modernizing its curriculum, completed its second multi-media reporting project, sponsored a two-bus caravan to the , obtained the funds to endow a new photojournalism scholarship and helped initiate a nationwide consortium of colleges sponsoring multimedia reporting abroad. The school also convened a new advisory group of media professionals and continued its program with the Mudra Institute of Communications (MICA) advertising school in India.

The new curriculum was developed after dozens of meetings that included faculty, students, alumni and industry professionals. It increases the number of classes in new media, while retaining traditional courses that will be relevant to the journalist of any age. Journalists will take more courses in photojournalism, web skills and video. Photojournalists will learn more about audio, video and the web. Advertising students will have new classes in branding, online presentation, media sales, consumer research and account planning. A new specialization – web producer – will educate students to operate the web sites of news organizations, government and nongovernment agencies and corporations. The curriculum was developed in consultation with a new advisory board of professionals and alumni, which met in October.

This summer, students put the final touches on the school’s second multi-media report. The Shawnee Forest: Illinois’ Hidden Gem should be back from the printers by October. It follows The Cairo Project, which was published two years ago. Both reports are in book form and are published in conjunction with a web site that contains additional information, including slideshows.

Another initiative in new journalism is the Campus Consortium. SIUC spearheaded the formation of the consortium, which brings young, multi-media journalists from the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting to Carbondale and campuses around the country. These are young, back-pack journalists using video to enhance their reports from around the world. They also are veteran journalists trying new reporting techniques.

The new, endowed scholarship is in the name of Ryan Rendleman, one of the journalism school’s most promising students, who was killed in a traffic accident in 2008 while on the way to a story for the Daily Egyptian. Fellow students, professors and Ryan’s family contributed to the $25,000 endowment, which made its first award this spring.

Students and faculty continue to gain national recognition for their work. Two student journalists were semi-finalists in the national Hearst competition. The Daily Egyptian won top national and state awards for its reporting and advertising students won Addys. AAF students continued their splendid participation in that organization’s Midwestern competition. Three faculty members and two graduate students were chosen to present papers at the recently completed AEJMC national conference in Boston. Follow this link to see and hear award winning work.

In addition, three new tenure-track professors, with strong research records, are joining the faculty this fall – Assistant Professors Aaron Veenstra and Wenjing Xie and Associate Professor Kavita Karan.

During the first week of October, the photojournalism professors and students will record a weekend in the life of Murphysboro, Ill. Photojournalists from around the country will help mentor our students during the workshop with the goal of producing a multi-media report that will be valuable to the community. Meanwhile, the DE has new video and audio equipment that enables reporters and photographers to file to the web when they return from stories. A completely redesigned DE website should be ready to launch later this fall.

Glad you’re here for this exciting year.

To read the past year's welcome message, continue to the next page.