FEATURE STORIES
2022
Dr. McFerguson Kicks off Black History Month with Panel, Wins Grant
February 1 • School of Communication and Multimedia Studies faculty Dr. Marquese McFerguson recently led a panel discussion in partnership with NSU Art Museum on Community Voices: Art and the African Diaspora .
The panel featured Edouard Duval-Carrie and Morel Doucet, who study African diaspora art. The virtual discussion consisted of journal editors, university press editors, and senior award-winning scholars of color within the discipline of Communication Studies, and was intended for junior faculty members (yet to receive tenure) and graduate students who identify as people of color. The panel also explored topics surrounding research methodologies, developing strategies, writing advice for academic purposes, and others.
The panel was funded by the National Communication Association - Advancing the Discipline Grant. The same grant will be used to fund another panel discussion to be led by Dr. McFerguson.
Adding to his list of recent achievements, an essay by Dr. McFerguson has been selected to be published in the Community Literacy Journal. Titled Higher Hussle: Nipsey Hussle’s Post Hip Hop Literacies, the essay mines popular music and media coverage of Nipsey Hussle to describe his artistry and advocacy anchored by his articulation of an African American diasporic identity, his ambivalence as an independent rapper within a mainstream music industry, and his leverage of Black capital in his Crenshaw community.
More Black History Month Events Here.
Newmark Journalism School hosts information session at SCMS
January 9 • The Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism at City University of New York (CUNY) recently organized an information session at SCMS.
The online information session was joined by the associate director of admissions at CUNY, Jeanette Tavarez. Also present was SCMS alum Max Maldonado (Multimedia Journalism, ’20).
Inspired by one such information session in 2018, Maldonado applied for the graduate program at CUNY after graduating in 2020. He got accepted into the program in fall 2020 and currently lives in New York City.
Maldonado recently shared his experience at CUNY in an interview with FAU’s South Florida Journal, a podcast produced by the students of SCMS (under the supervision of Dr. Kevin Petrich). He talked about his reporting experience at the Community District 9, located in the Bronx.
“They put you in a community district for your entire time that you are at CUNY,” said Maldonado, “…(you can) do really hyper local reporting and gain a lot of contacts within a certain area, … to really just ground yourself into the community.”
More information about the journalism graduate program at CUNY can be found here.
You can hear the complete interview of Max Maldonado at South Florida Journal.
(Photo, In Conversation podcast production team (Summer 2019): Back row from left, Max Maldonado, Senior Producer; Dr. Kevin Petrich, Executive Producer; Luke Finamore; Dean Dr. Michael Horswell. Front row from left, Amber Kelley, Diana Campos, and Yasmeen Van Arkel. All students are now alumni.)
2021
Using Medium to Publish Student Work
November 2 • Journalism professors are encouraging their students to use digital publishing platforms and one such professor in the department is SCMS Senior Instructor Ilene Prusher. She is also a journalist and has been published in TIME Magazine, NBC News Think, The New York Times, The Washington Post, and others.
“I have been using Medium in the last few years as a way to give my students a platform for stories that they worked on in class,” says Prusher. She noticed that other journalism professors were using the publishing platform for their courses, pushing the students “to really bump up their game and get the article ready for publication.”
“I find that sometimes students will think, well, this is just an assignment for class, but if they know that the expectation is actually no, we're going to report it, fact check, edit it, publish it, format it and send it out into the world, it really is . . . a whole other level of responsibility . . . to the story, to your sources, to being accurate,” adds Prusher. The assignment is not only helping students to produce journalistic articles but also helping them build their portfolios.
Prusher elaborated that some of her students "have gone on to use those links, to the stories, to add to their portfolios, to get internships and jobs, you know, while they're getting towards the end of their academic career.”
The latest student publication edited and supervised by Prusher, Pandemic Portraits, includes a collection of profile feature stories done by students on people whose lives were impacted by the pandemic. From healthcare professionals to small business owners, entrepreneurs, teachers, and others, students chose people from all backgrounds for their stories.
Prusher serves as an editor to other SCMS student publications on Medium such as Global Vibe, The Sunshine Report, and Immigration Nation.
FAU Celebrates Constitution Week
September 9 • Join the Florida Atlantic University community in a series of events from September 13th to September 21st that celebrate the importance of the U.S. Constitution. This wide-ranging series of events includes:
Discussion of the Judicial Branch and Exercising Your Right to Vote
The series starts with a Zoom virtual event—a panel discussion on The Judicial Branch and Exercising Your Right to Vote with Judges Cymonie Rowe and Daliah Weiss (15th Judicial Circuit of Florida), and Judge Melanie G. May (4th District Court of Appeal of Florida) on Monday, Sept. 13th.
The Right to Vote and The Constitution
The Robert J. Bailyn Symposium on The First Amendment presents a lecture by Astead Herndon, National Political Reporter for The New York Times on The Right to Vote and The Constitution. Astead is an incredibly accomplished and dynamic young journalist. You've probably read his work in The Times or seen him as a guest on CNN. OLLI Auditorium, Tuesday Sept. 14th from 2-3pm.
The Rise of the Constitution
Declare and decorate your own Constitution while exploring the rise of the U.S. Constitution. The event on Tuesday, Sept. 14th, 1:30 - 2 PM, is free and open to all students.
Movie Night: National Treasure
Enjoy a free movie night watching the film National Treasure at the Oasis Lounge, on the Davie Campus Student Union, Friday, Sept.19th, 4 - 6:30 PM. For more information, email ncarte10@fau.edu.
Individual Freedoms vs Collective Responsibility: A Debate Over America’s Future
On Tuesday, Sept. 21tst from 12 pm to 1 PM at the Social Science Building Rotunda on the Boa Campus, join this event, hosted by Breezeway Dialogues: Diverse Viewpoints Through Civil Discourse on Individual Freedoms vs Collective Responsibility: A Debate Over America’s Future. Listen to panelists Dr. Allan Barsky, Professor of Social Science, and Dr. Nicole Morse, Assistant Professor in the School of Communication and Multimedia Studies, as they discuss topics such as gun control, election laws, and COVID vaccines. The event is free and open to FAU students, faculty, and staff.
Constitution Week events at FAU are sponsored by the Jack Miller Forum. Other departments supporting the events include the Diversity Platform, Division of Student Affairs and Enrollment Management, FAU Deptartment of Political Science, School of Communication and Multimedia Studies, and Osher Lifelong Learning Institute.
Due to the surge in COVID-19 cases, all participants, regardless of vaccination status, are expected to wear masks while indoors in any FAU facilities. Anyone exhibiting flu-like symptoms will be asked to leave the venue to support the safety and protection of the university community.
Digital Culture: A new IFP course teaches everything digital, from AI to digital art
April 13 • Starting Fall 2021, the School of Communication and Multimedia Studies will be offering a new IFP course titled DIG 2202- Digital Culture.
The course surveys digital culture and the technologies that make it possible. Students will learn about a wide array of elements of digital culture, including the politics of AI, digital consumption, surveillance tech, hacker and gamer culture, and the possibilities of digital art.
Digital Culture will be taught by Dr. Andrea Miller of the SCMS, who has a background in feminist, digital media, and science and technology studies.
Dr. Miller says that the class will show students ways to think deeply about the technologies in their everyday lives, from smartphones to social media to streaming and gaming platforms.
“I think students in my classes are often surprised to learn how messy technological systems really are and that the ideas behind them are often not as new as people imagine,” they say.
They are interested in how technologies reproduce or intensify different forms of social inequality, particularly for technologies used in warfare and policing.
The three-credit class is scheduled every Monday and Wednesday from 4 pm to 5:20 pm. Students will receive three of the six credit hours for the Foundations of Society & Human Behavior requirement.
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Speaker Center
Academic Integrity is more than just plagiarism. It is about how you conduct yourself with honor in all that you do. This conversation will help you better understand the various forms of integrity, and why integrity is important. This Integrity Week event features Dr. Clevis Headley, Associate Professor of Philosophy.
Paradigm Press
Artificial intelligence can transform our lives but also present great peril. Data's "objectivity" promises fairness and less bias in law enforcement. But opaque and unaccountable algorithms can fall short. Researcchers found that the models in a commercial algorithm used by Broward County to predict recidivism were biased against African Americans, and no more accurate than human guessers.
Julia Dressel talks about her work on criminal justice reform at the technology firm Recidiviz. Panelists include Susan Schneider, Deitrich Chair of Philosophy, and Jason Hallstrom, FAU ISense. Moderated by Gerald Sim, School of Communication and Multimedia Studies.
Student Creates Short Documentary Series to Highlight Artists Amidst Pandemic
An undergraduate student in the School of Communication & Multimedia Studies, Moises Linares is producing a series of short documentary/interview videos featuring talented musicians.
Through his series, 4Beat Media, Linares wants to capture the journey of musicians developing their crafts as artists, and share what it takes to innovate in the music scene while expressing passion and commitment to living and breathing art.
A musician himself, Linares was inspired to create the series seeing how the pandemic is affecting musicians and other artists. "..a lot of workers that are involved in the live music scene, they are either laid off or they are on unemployment," says Linares. He wants to "help those musicians so they can know their story."
He hopes to connect with other SCMS filmmakers and creatives to collaborate on future episodes, and feature talented artists. The first episode of the series was released in September and features a Fort Lauderdale, Fl, based artist, Daniel "Felix El Gato" Garcia. Drummer, bassist, DJ, and a Bboy performer, Felix has merged his passion for dance and music, to create his unique style.
2020
National Communication Association Inducts 31 SCMS Students
Lambda Pi Eta welcomed 31 students from the School of Communications and Multimedia Studies at FAU in a virtual induction ceremony held on Dec. 4. A complete list of the inductees is on the ceremony program (.pdf); the ceremony can be viewd on this video.
The ceremony began with the opening remarks from chapter advisor, Dr. Matthew Sobnosky, followed by a welcome speech from SCMS Director Dr. Carol Mills.
The communication honors society awards membership to undergraduate students who have completed 60 semester credit hours, including 12 communication studies courses, and have a cumulative GPA of at least 3.0 in all the courses taken, with a minimum GPA of 3.25 in all communication courses.
Living the American dream in China’s Wild West: Award-Winning Documentary by SCMS Faculty Adam Smith
FAU School of Communication and Multimedia Studies Critical Conversation Series, recorded June 23, 2020 with guest panelists Nancy Ancrum (Miami Herald), Rick Christie (Palm Beach Post), Astead W. Herndon (New York Times), and Terence W. Shepherd (WLRN News). Moderated by SCMS faculty Dr. Deandre Poole and Ilene Prusher.