Bayview magazine

The FIU SJMC Alumni Magazine

The STEM Issue Elliot Sklar Class of 2006 Assistant Director of the Master of Public Health Program at Nova Southeastern University

VOLUME 3

Staff Writers Alejandra Cuadra Natalie Garcia Celina Ishahak Rebekah Keida Yovel Lagziel Yesenia Lauzurique Katie Lepri Tatiana Lozama Ivanna Medina Katherine Pereda Aaleeyah Pringle Amanda Rabines Victoria Varela

Staff Photographer

Letter from the Dean Contributors

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Meet our Knight Innovator in Residence: Alex De Carvalho

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What’s New in SJMC Graduate Programs

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SJMC Events

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Meet your Professor: Chris Delboni

Katie Lepri

Layout and Design Aaleeyah Pringle Alejandra Cuadra Celina Ishahak Yovel Lagziel Yesenia Lauzurique Tatiana Lozama Ivanna Medina Victoria Varela

Photography Contributors Katie Lepri Rebekah Keida Ivanna Medina Amanda Rabines Victoria Varela

Copy Editors Juliet Pinto Chris Delboni

Art Director Elizabeth Marsh CONTACT BAYVIEW AT FLORIDA INTERNATIONAL UNIVERSITY BISCAYNE BAY CAMPUS 3000 NE 151 STREET, AC-2 335 BayView is published by Florida International University’s School of Journalism and Mass Communication and distributed free of charge to alumni, faculty and friends of the University. Reproduction in whole or in part without permission is prohibited.

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SJMC Faculty Working On HIV And Health

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SJMC Faculty Keep Their Eyes On Sea Level Rise

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Cover Story: Communicating Wellness: SJMC Alumni in Health

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SJMC Alumni Bring People Together Using Technology

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How STEM Stumbled into the Professional Lives of Two SJMC Alums

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Aquarius, Aquanauts and Life Under the Sea

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MAST@FIU: High School Students Merge STEM with Journalistm

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Student Highlights

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Class Notes

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Faculty Notes

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Dear SJMC Alumni and Friends, Happy NewYear! Please allow me to introduce the third annual issue of BayView, our FIU-SJMC alumni magazine. Besides highlighting SJMC programs and initiatives, BayView also focuses on what our alumni are up to, and this issue pays special attention to what’s going on in the areas of science, technology, environmental and health communication.

Our cover story profiles alumni working in the health industries, and you’ll also find out more about grads working in the tech and environmental fields. In addition to SJMC faculty and student profiles, you’ll also find a profile on Alex De Carvalho, the first Knight Innovator in Residence at the SJMC. When you read these pages, you’ll see that this past year, your School of Journalism and Mass Communication has undertaken a variety of exciting projects, including a major initiative related to sea level rise and climate change that involved not only SJMC faculty and students, but also major local media and even MAST@FIU high school students.

This spring, we would love to see you get involved in two projects here at the School. On February 13 and 14, we’ll sponsor the first Media Party Miami, an event created to celebrate and showcase innovation in journalism and communication in the Americas. We have invited an exciting group of innovators from the US and Latin America, who will be coming to Miami to discuss the future of media and technology.

Another major SJMC event is our annual Communications Week, scheduled for the week of March 23. You can expect to see a variety of programs and activities that week, involving alumni, local professionals, and our students and faculty. Consider yourself invited to participate in any way you can, including by volunteering as a speaker. Please visit our jmc.fiu.edu web site for more information on both events.

As in past years, this issue of BayView was all written by our students, under the supervision of Dr. Juliet Pinto and Prof. Elizabeth Marsh, and with the expert help of Professor Chris Delboni. Please read it carefully because we put it together especially for you.

After you browse BayView, please take a moment to drop us a note and let us know what you have been up to. We’ll love to hear from you!

Cheers, Raul Reis

The Contributors

Tatiana Lozama

Rebekah Keida

Alejandra Cuadra Celina Ishahak

Yovel Lagziel

Yesenia Lauzurique

Not pictured: Natalie Garcia Katherine Pereda

Katie Lepri

Aaleeyah Pringle Ivanna Medina

Victoria Varela Amanda Rabines 3

Meet our Knight Innovator in Residence: Alex De Carvalho

By Amanda Rabines and Rebekah Keida

A

lex de Carvalho has moved around—a lot. He has lived in Russia, Brazil, Ghana, the UK, France and Portugal. Today, he loves traveling, but growing up as a child of a Brazilian diplomat, it was challenging to adjust to so many different language barriers.

“When I was living in Paris, I felt like I wanted to find my circle of friends.

I was wondering how I would do that because I’m not French,” said Carvalho.

“I figured with the Internet, I can reach out to more people, so I embraced it.”

Carvalho started blogging in 2004. And he got good at it. So much so, that by the time he moved back to Miami in 2009, he had already successfully developed online social media strategies for businesses like ScrapBlog, Middlebrook Group, and DioraNews. Now, Carvalho, 46, will become FIU’s first Knight Innovator in Residence, a collaboration between the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation and Florida International University.

“I’m very excited about this. My friends say, ‘There’s no way you can fail because, well, no one’s ever done it before,’” said Carvalho, laughing.

But Carvalho wouldn’t come to help if he weren’t prepared.

As FIU’s Knight Innovator, Carvalho plans to approach his new position in three ways: as an educator, a scholar and a catalyst.

“I’ll be working with the faculty to look at what new forces and modules we [FIU] should be developing to be more digital and more social media friendly,” said Carvalho. “The point of social media is to engage to build a community and interact more ethically with people.”

Dean of the School of Journalism and Mass Communication Raul Reis said Carvalho will be preparing students for today’s professional landscape.

“We need somebody who is a professional with a lot of recent industry experience,” said Reis.

Matt Haggman, program director of the Knight Foundation, agrees. He trusts Carvalho will provide faculty and students with the right tools and mentorship to 4

heighten Miami’s entrepreneurial activity.

“The Knight Innovator is going to provide the tools to leverage that great streak we have here in Miami,” said Haggman. “He is going to create activity, so we can continue to make Miami even more of a place where innovators realize that.”

Carvalho is behind some key efforts that make Miami a hot spot for innovators to visit. He founded different entrepreneurial and technical operations, like Social Media Club South Florida, The Startup Forum and BarCamp Miami. He also co-founded RefreshMiami, Miami’s largest tech community.

“Social media seems to be very virtual and online, but it’s also very local,” said Carvalho.

In order to build a tech-social community at FIU, Carvalho hopes to examine new digital trends with students as well as engage them in tech-events like LAB Miami.

“We have a lot of local tech opportunities that are very open and help a lot of entrepreneurs start off,” said Carvalho.

“Students should take advantage of meetups because they can attend them through social media.”

With all the advantages of social media, it’s hard to imagine a world without its presence, but Carvalho remembers it rather well. In 1994, when social media was new and unorthodox, Carvalho attended a top ranked business school in Europe to earn an MBA in business.

“I learned all the wrong things in marketing,” joked Carvalho. “It’s because of social media that everything changed.

I had to unlearn what I learned.”

After moving to Miami from Paris, Carvalho continued engaging in the digital world.

“I wanted to work in tech-related fields because everything these days has a tech component,” he said. “It’s all online and

technology and social media allow people to be entrepreneurs.”

He brought the same concept into the classroom.

For four years, Carvalho taught graduate-level classes on social media for journalism and public relations at the University of Miami. In his class, students learned the latest techniques of online expression and community building.

Carvalho also co-authored the McGraw Hill published book, “Securing the Clicks: Network Security in the Age of Social Media.”

“I started learning about social media 11 years ago. I started blogging. I started joining social networks,” he said. “I was in the process of trying new things out. And I think that’s my own message: to always be curious, always be learning because that’s the influence behind my career.”

What’s New in SJMC Graduate Programs?

Miami Ad School

By Rebekah Keida and Amanda Rabines

Grizelle De Los Reyes, graduate coordinator of the SJMC Global Strategic Communications creative track, a joint program between SJMC and the Miami Ad School, emphasizes that students are in school to get a job.

“As a student you just want to go out there and get employed,” said De Los Reyes.

“That’s why you go to school.”

Students within the GSC creative track program graduate in five semesters with a

Miami Ad students present their research for Wendy’s

Spanish-Language Master’s Program

By Amanda Rabines

The Spanish-Language Master’s Program at FIU is the first journalism graduate program in the country to offer students a curriculum taught entirely in Spanish.

It specializes in Spanish-language journalism and multimedia, bi-lingual journalism and Spanishlanguage journalism in Latin American and Caribbean studies.

“Hispanic media is a rather small community and an amazing network. It’s the place to serve the media industry and the Hispanic media audience,”said Leonardo Ferreira, director of the Spanish-Language

Master’s Program. “Research is a must for me, and there’s a lot of untold stories in the Hispanic community that we need to tell and tell well.”

Today, the program trains graduate students in investigative journalism, digital video edition and multi-media production.

“There are new ways of telling stories,” said Lilliam Martinez-Bustos, a career coordinator and assistant professor at SJMC, who teaches multimedia in the Spanish-language program. “Little by little, you need to show that you don’t have to use the same platform every time.”

master’s degree in mass communication and a portfolio from the Miami Ad School.

De Los Reyes believes that this type of real world experience is why there is such a high employment rate for graduates of both sub-tracks: copy-writing and art direction.

“Students do so many internships that usually the same agencies hire them,” said De Los Reyes. “I’ve had students do internships in China and France.”

Last year, FIU-SJMC was approached

by Wendy’s, a multi-billion dollar company, to help find a way to get the Latino market to buy their burgers.

So for the first time, the GSC and the GSC creative program collaborated to take on the project.

“Between my account planning class, the research classes of Dr. Wang [head of communication research] and the MAS creative strategy class, we simulated an ad agency,” said De Los Reyes.

She says that that’s the beauty between the collaboration with the MAS: that you are in school working on real advertising campaigns.

“Students become a highly desirable candidate for employment,” De Los Reyes said. “Advertising agencies just snatch them up.”

Global Strategic Communications

By Rebekah Keida

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or those already in the professional realm, or students living abroad, visiting SJMC professor Aileen Izquierdo coordinates the online GSC program. After completing the 12month program, students from anywhere in the world will graduate with a master in science in mass communication.

Some of the Spanish-Language Master’s Program faculty.

Izquierdo believes that both the oncampus GSC and the online GSC programs at FIU are great fits for anyone looking to take their career in communications to the next level.

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SJMC

S T N

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2014

King Tide Day

By Victoria Varela and Ivanna Medina

SJMC faculty brought attention to rising sea levels when they held “King Tide Day.” Fifty FIU and 20 Mast Academy students conducted water experiments with sensors to test sea level rise as part of the event on Oct. 9, 2014.

The event featured EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy, Florida Sen. Bill Nelson, Rhode Island Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, Miami Beach Mayor Philip Levine and Pinecrest Mayor Cindy Lerner to discuss the impacts of SLR and climate change.

“Climate change isn’t about faraway places,” said McCarthy.

“It’s about impact today and the safety of our communities to the viability of our commercial enterprises and public health of the families across the United States.”

The event brought awareness to the challenges Miami communities face with rising sea levels.

Called “King Tide Day” by its SJMC faculty developers, the event brought attention to the annual king tides, typically the highest of the year, which have traditionally resulted in flooding across South Florida.

Through this experience, students had the opportunity to get involved with an issue that is directly affecting their community.

It got them engaged around crowd hydrology and sensor journalism by learning how to execute a successful scientific experiment, raise awareness and involve the community.

“I’m really thankful to be part of something that is important for our generation and future generations to come,” said Pamela Cruz, 8th grade student at MAST@FIU.

SJMC hopes to engage students and communities around SLR and to make good decisions as a community in the face of continuously rising sea levels.

“If you’re asking yourself why a school of journalism is involved in a SLR event, please know that this is what we are about,” SJMC Dean Raul Reis said. “FIU is a solution center for South Florida and the world. We want our students to learn about reporting, gathering information and crafting messages in a practical way and in a way that will have practical applications for the real world.”

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FIU Hosts JournCamp

By Amanda Rabines

SJMC joined forces with the Society of Professional Journalists to host its first ever JournCamp at FIU, a daylong workshop on practical skills and training for journalists.

About 60 reporters, freelancers, students and teachers came to Biscayne Bay Campus to hear about the latest trends in journalism and learn about its new tools.

Attendees were able to participate in four different topic sessions given by specialized trainers.

The two-hour sessions included: “Be a Mojo: Shoot, Edit and Publish Video Packages on the Fly,” by Cindy

E. Rodriguez; “Narrative Journalism: From Beat to Book,” by Cynthia Barnett; “Capturing Tomorrow: Emerging Trends in Photography,” by Samaruddin Stewart; and “New Tricks and Treats for Watchdogs: Online Data and Google Fusion Tables,” by Doug Haddix.

One of the participants was Mimi Whitefield, Miami Herald’s Cuba and international business correspondent.

“It was an excellent seminar on how to get your book published,” said Whitefield, about Barnett’s narrative journalism session. “It’s good for younger reporters, too, because

they’re learning skills to develop their careers.”

Scott A. Leadingham, director of education and a member of the national SPJ board, worked with FIU’s SPJ student chapter to develop its seventh

JournCamp, thus far.

“The diversity of attendees was definitely present,” said Leadingham. “It was a good decision to come here because there are so many people we want to reach.”

Martin Baron, The Washington Post Editor, speaks to SJMC

By Victoria Varela

Martin Baron, executive editor of The Washington Post, told a packed ballroom last November that students at FIU come with no sense of entitlement, an important quality to succeed in the field of communication today.

“They come only with aspirations and the goal of achievement,” he said. “They rely on hard work, ingenuity, a spirit of possibility, and a determination to seize on opportunity.”

That was part of an optimistic message he left for students at his Hearst Distinguished Lecture Series, “Media, journalism, and the future of news in the Digital Age.”

“Nothing in media – not journalism, not advertising, not communications of any type – remains at rest. It is not what it was

10 years ago. It is not what it was five years ago. It is not what it will be five years from now, or even two,” he said. “That turbulence can be unsettling. But the upheaval means unparalleled opportunities for those who are willing to learn what they need – and know that the learning must never stop.”

Lauren Gottlieb, an SJMC senior, was glad she attended the lecture.

“I thought it was very insightful,” she said. “Being that I graduate this fall, I needed some words of encouragement from someone who works in the field and this is exactly what Martin Baron did.”

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Faculty Highlights

Meet Your Professor: Chris Delboni

By Katie Lepri

In her undergraduate journalism classes, SJMC Prof. Chris Delboni emphasizes to students about what she believes are the most important values of journalism: accuracy, fairness and balance.

Delboni is the news director for SJMC’s South Florida News Service, which serves as an alternative for the news writing and reporting and advanced news writing classes.

“Every time I meet a new student and I make a difference on his or her life, that’s my satisfaction,” said Delboni, who recently won the Society of Professional Journalist David L. Eshelman Outstanding Campus Adviser Award as FIU chapter’s faculty adviser. “I think my mission is to help as many as possible through this profession.”

Her students call her “Chris” and most have working relationships with her both in and out of the newsroom. Many consider her not only an editor but also a mentor and guide for their academic careers.

Her classes can be difficult for some students but have proved beneficial because she’s interested in elevating her students’ academic pursuits into professional careers.

“I think everyone can say that she’s made us cry, but it’s always led to something better,” said Marisol Medina, senior

print journalism student who took Delboni’s SFNS in-depth reporting class two semesters ago. “I’ve learned the importance of a deadline and the importance of accuracy with her. I learned professionalism.”

Delboni’s award-winning journalism career unexpectedly began because of her decision to move to Washington, D.C., from her hometown of São Paulo to study English. It was in the capital that Delboni saw the rise of the feminist and black movements. She was quickly inspired.

“For the first time, I realized that I could make a difference just by being part of different movements that care for people.”

She started freelancing for Brazilian magazines, writing profiles for Veja, Claudia magazine and Marie Claire. She covered anything she could get her hands on.

“I liked it, but it took a lot out of me to write long articles,” she said.

Through her parents, she was introduced to the owner of Bandeirantes, a Brazilian radio and TV network. Being impressed by her work, the owner offered her a position as a foreign correspondent for the network. She took the job.

“It was like an unpaid internship basically, but I was all over the place,” she said. “I was at the White House; I was in Congress.

I was getting the feeling that I was giving people a voice.”

This experience turned her on to journalism as a profession.

“I was all over Washington, going live throughout the day. I had never done radio, but I kept getting better at it and totally fell in love,” said Delboni. “I would just go live and interview somebody and then they would go live to Brazil. I would see the difference that I was making through that process.”

Delboni created a name for herself as a young foreign correspondent, an unusual position for a new journalist.

“I had to pretty much keep learning.”

Determined to stay in Washington, she took a job as a general assignment reporter and financial correspondent for Brazil’s Globo News TV. She built a solid reputation as a trusted journalist.

“I made a decision what kind of journalist I wanted to become and now I can write about anything, but when you’re building your reputation, you really have to be careful because if you make one mistake, it’s over.”

Her transition to education took place after Sept. 11, 2001, when she saw big networks act less like reporters who critically examined the facts and more like what she called “parrots.”

That’s when she realized she wanted to teach and mentor. But Delboni didn’t let go of her day job: While an instructor at SJMC, Delboni also publishes a column, Direto de Miami, online at O Estado de S. Paulo, a major Brazilian daily.

As she emphasizes how important it is that students “learn to learn,” she says by remaining active in the field, she also keeps learning.

She gives5 percent of the grade for humility and good attitude.

“I had enough humility throughout my career that I could see the good people who had a lot more experience than me and I would go to them,” she said. “I wasn’t afraid to ask questions to the people who could help me along the way and then I would just sit and learn and study.”

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M E D I C I N E / M A T H

E N V I R O N M E N TA L / E N G I N E E R I N G

T E C H N O LO G Y

SCIENCE

zzz

M C

S T E M

SJMC GRADS STAND OUT IN STEM

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SJMC

FACULTY

Working On

HIV & Health

By Aaleeyah Pringle

M

iami-Dade County ranks first in Florida for the number of new HIV/AIDS cases, according to the Florida Department of Health. SJMC professors at FIU have been working to bring awareness to this issue and help reduce the rates of HIV. Impressive strides have been made in the health community of South Florida through the combined efforts of professors Allan Richards, and Kate MacMillin.

Associate Dean Richards, who once was pre-med in his studies, was always passionate about health issues. In 2008, he focused his passions on HIV and began tracking the infection rates in the US, but specifically in Miami.

In conducting his research he found that media coverage of HIV in Miami was largely underrepresented and began to look at HIV coverage on a global scale.

“The Miami area was considered the epicenter for the disease in the United States,” Richards said. “And South Africa was considered the epicenter globally.”

In 2009, Richards teamed up with Assistant Professor MacMillin, and proposed a

Kate MacMillin 10

“Our activism as professors is to tell them [students] to keep it alive— to keep reporting,” - Professor Richards writing competition where the two winners traveled with him to South Africa to report the media coverage of HIV/AIDS. MacMillin has extensive 30-year experience in television production. She has created documentaries, produced programming for cable networks and public television.

Together, MacMillin and Richards created an award-winning documentary, “Lessons from South Africa,” which reported on the South African media’s thorough and highly effective response to the HIV/AIDS pandemic.

Richards and MacMillin also co-executive produced the web series, “The Stigma Stops with Me.” Both the documentary and web series lead to a one-hour TV special which aired on WPBT in 2009, “Tell Somebody: The New Face of AIDS.”

Allan Richards

Maria-Elena Villar

Richards believes that now his role is to pass the torch of covering HIV to current SJMC students.

“Our activism as professors is to tell them [students] to keep it alive— to keep reporting,” Richards said.

Like Richards and MacMillin, Dr. Maria Elena Villar, interim chair of the department of advertising and public relations at SJMC, also has a history in health.

While obtaining her undergraduate degree in Santiago, Chile, Villar completed a PAHO (Pan-American health organization) sponsored certificate in Social health Management that led her to pursue a master’s in public health.

“I never wanted to be a clinician but I was interested in improving people’s health.

And to do that you must understand science, health, people’s beliefs, behaviors, and communications,” Villar said.

Throughout her master’s studies, she learned a lot about basic science, clinical research and community based health.

Her studies included HIV/AIDS clinical trials, lipid laboratory conduction blood test procedures, and field Epidemiology of indigenous communities in Panama and Honduras.

“Working in medical clinical trials, I realized that one of my strengths was translating the science as well as the risks and benefits to the community,” Villar said.

“That’s what filled my interests in health and communication.”

SJMC Faculty Keep Their Eyes On Sea Level Rise

By Amanda Rabines

P

rofessor Susan Jacobson, a Florida native, moved from Philadelphia to Miami last summer.

Before long, she noticed a recurring issue.

In autumn, when rain is heavy and the tides are high, Jacobson’s entire neighborhood floods.

“It happens again and again,” said Jacobson. “And it’s directly related to sea level rise.”

Jacobson lives two miles from the beach. However, this low-elevation neighborhood is what FIU’s Journalism and Mass Communication professors Robert (Ted) E. Gutsche, Jr., Susan Jacobson, Kate MacMillin, Juliet Pinto and their students would call vulnerable to flooding.

Through a project called “crowd hydrology,” these SJMC faculty are developing classes and course material to bring attention to problems associated with the impacts of sea level rise.

“The term crowd hydrology was first uttered by someone in the South Florida Water Management District,” Jacobson said. “We were quick to associate it with crowd sourcing and journalism.”

Crowd hydrology first resonated in spring, not long after MacMillin and Pinto finished producing the award winning documentary, “South Florida’s Rising Seas.”

The four professors were interested in SLR and quickly linked up after discovering the Challenge Fund for Innovation in Journalism Education, a journalism consortium, sought cutting-edge journalism projects to generously fund.

“We [SJMC faculty] got together one day and said, ‘we’ll have a much more successful application if we merged all our ideas together,’” said Gutsche.

He was right.

In a pool of 124 applications, their proposal won a place in the top, and the group won a $35,000 grant to investigate SLR and create a database where residents can report floods.

“Because there are so many different organizations that deal with flooding, it’s not clear who gets these reports,” said Jacobson. “There’s no standard reporting methodology.”

So Jacobson is helping to start one.

With her expertise in technology, Jacobson will help students maintain an interactive website and mobile app, to report and record floods on sight.

This requires skills in HTML, CSS3 and JavaScript.

“My students are hand coding from scratch,” said Jacobson. “It’s a lot of work, but the students have risen to the occasion.”

While Jacobson focuses on the website

Ted Gutsche, Kate MacMillin, Susan Jacobson and Juliet Pinto are the sea level rise team.

and new app, MacMillin uses her background in television production to help students create multimedia stories on SLR. “I come from video storytelling, so my job always is to ask, ‘how we can see it,’” said MacMillin.

In her classes, MacMillin’s students have chosen specific topics they want to research about sea level rise.

“Climate change is a key issue for this century,” said MacMillin. “I think students are engaged and excited about exploring this because they’re in the front lines to communicate it.”

This would make Professor Pinto on the leading edge.

Out of the four professors, Pinto has the most extensive background in environmental science journalism.

“Communicating sea level is a passion and a research interest,” said Pinto. “The more I learned about it, the more I realized what an immediate problem it poses.”

Such problems include damaging impacts to one’s own properties, insurance, built infrastructures, environments and even drinking water.

For this reason, Pinto feels it important to do a lot of her work in Spanish.

“It’s important to me that our community, being predominately Spanish, is really armed with the information they need to make good decisions,” said Pinto.

Gutsche agrees and is also interested in giving back, especially through the mentorship program established between FIU students and MAST Academy high school students to create projects that collect SLR data.

“What’s fascinating here is that around the elements of technology and around the elements of science there’s and educational element that develops, not just knowledge, but a sense of identity and partnership.”

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COMMUNICATING WELLNESS: SJMC ALUMNI IN HEALTH

By Aaleeyah Pringle

Take Miami” and “The Real Housewives of Miami” are learning tools that Sklar uses to teach the components of providing quality healthcare to individuals who are homeless.

the behavior of others than do health care professionals.”

Sklar shows an excerpt from the popular reality show “Kourtney and Kim Take Miami” when the two girls retrace the steps of the homeless man who was attacked and had his face eaten off on the MacArthur Causeway.

Project HOPE (Homelessness in Osteopathic Predoctoral Education) focuses on curriculum geared toward addressing the deficiencies of providing quality health care to the homeless population.

“They made a comedy out of it in one of their shows,” Sklar said. “I include that [video] in something that I teach about sensitivity when dealing with homelessness.”

I

n Elliot Sklar’s Humanism and Health class, he shows video snippets from “Kourtney and Kim Take Miami” and “The Real Housewives” to a room of about 250 first-year medical students.

Not the typical teaching technique for a medical school professor.

“All of my med school presentations include snippets from television,” said Sklar, SJMC class of 2006. “I probably wouldn’t do that if I wasn’t a graduate of SJMC.” The video clips of “Kourtney and Kim 12

Sklar, assistant director of the Master of Public Health program at Nova Southeastern University, uses media as an effective way to bring health issues to popular culture so that everyone can relate to them.

Sklar knew that he wanted to have a career in health even before applying to SJMC in 2004 for his master’s degree in integrated marketing communications. He believed that understanding marketing would enable him to make a larger impact in the health field.

“I selected SJMC because it allowed me to study health related issues from a marketing standpoint,” Sklar said. “I believe that we [individuals] in marketing and communications know how to better influence

Sklar is also the project director for the grant funding Project HOPE. It is a $1.5 million, five-year grant initiative of the Health Resources and Services Administration.

Sklar credits his unusual path to success to his willingness to go against the grain.

His advice to current SJMC students?

“Always think outside the box and never take no for an answer.”

Like Sklar, another alum who took a non-traditional career track after graduation from SJMC is Lissette Egues.

Since her early years in high school doing morning announcements over the school intercom, Egues, class of 2000, knew that communication was her passion.

Egues graduated with a Masters in Integrated Marketing Communications.

After spending 14 years in marketing at the Miami Herald, Egues decided to take her skills and experience to Baptist Health in South Florida.

“At the end of the day, I’m still doing communications. It’s just what you’re presenting and what you’re selling is different,” Egues said.

Egues made the decision to switch from a traditional news company to a career in STEM when she learned that Baptist would be expanding its services into Broward County in 2009.

“I knew some of the challenges that [Baptist] was going to have would be very similar to those of Miami Herald,” Egues said.

During her last eight years at the Miami Herald, Egues acquired first-hand knowledge while expanding the Herald into Broward, which was a critical area for business growth.

She then took that knowledge to Baptist.

“The different areas of business that I helped manage at the Miami Herald, which were advertising, business sales and community relations were things that were needed at Baptist,” Egues said.

Throughout her successful career, Egues’ proudest moment comes from winning the Hispanic Women of Distinction award in 2008.

“I am passionate about making our community a better place to live, and being recognized as a Hispanic woman who is trying to make those changes is very important to me,” Egues said.

Egues hopes to one day become a professor at a university after her two daughters, ages 11 and 13, are out of grade school. Egues’ oldest daughter, who exhibits signs of following in her mother’s footsteps, has expressed interest in exploring entertainment broadcasting.

“My oldest does the morning announcements, which is what I did when I was in school,” Egues said. “It’s interesting to see her passion be similar to mine at that age.”

Similar to Egues, FIU grad Daniel Espinosa, class of 2013, took his bachelor of science in Mass Communications and Media Studies to the health field.

“The way I learned to write by SJMC is highly regarded in my field. A lot of people in marketing take marketing, but they don’t take a communications class or a journalism class, but SJMC gives you all of it,” Espinosa said.

Espinosa began his work in health as a corporate marketing coordinator for Simply Health Care Plans, an HMO for Medicare and Medicaid health plans. However, doing marketing for a health company was not in the plans for Espinosa.

“I kind of just fell into it honestly,” Espinosa said. “It was never a goal of mine to be in the health field, but I am happy I did.

Now I know a different aspect of marketing.”

Currently, Espinosa serves as the marketing chair for Taking Care of Testicular Cancer (TC2), a non-profit organization benefiting Testicular Cancer awareness and research. TC2 is still in its beginning stages, but next year will be its first large-scale event, according to Espinosa.

Elliot Sklar

“Right now we’re looking for sponsors,” Espinosa said. “We’re doing a huge gala, and we’re looking to give our sponsors special deals such as free entry and seating.”

Daniel Espinosa

Espinosa was drawn to becoming a part of TC2 because he said testicular cancer doesn’t receive as much attention as some of the other well-known cancers.

“Testicular cancer isn’t the most severe of cancers but it is cancer nonetheless.

It can move to other parts of your body just like other cancers,” Espinosa said. “We try to bring awareness and make sure people know about it, and I think we’re doing pretty well.”

Espinosa is also the founder and president of the SJMC alumni chapter at FIU. He is responsible for maintaining stable relations between the chapter, the FIU Alumni Association, SJMC and over 7,000 SJMC alumni.

When asked if he felt like he made the right decision to go into the health field, Espinosa had this to say: “I am very proud of the career choices that I’ve made, as well as choosing to go to SJMC for my education.”

Another proud alum of SJMC is Nikki Waskiewicz, class of 2008.

Waskiewicz graduated with a master of science in mass communication. Since earning her degree, she worked at a traditional news publication, but switched to working in the health field.

Continued on page 22 13

SJMC Alumni Bring People Together Using Technology

By Tatiana Lozama and Rebekah Keida

FIU’s journalism students are merging communication with technology to further their endeavors and help communities in innovative and surprising ways.

For example, Global Strategic Communications graduate student Sandeep Varry of the class of 2015 merges engineering and communication to maintain a support system for the students enrolled at FIU. He believes his love of communication and technology is perfectly blended in his new degree, as well as his current position at FIU, as coordinator of computer applications for the dean’s office at the College of Engineering.

He says the program reflects the changing media environment.

“Gone is the day when you can work in communication and run from technology,” said Varry.

It is Varry’s job to help his department communicate between the students and faculty. Varry creates and maintains the database that handles the registrations, payments and customer service inquiries made within the engineering programs.

Sandeep Vary “Before I joined the Division of External Programs, they [FIU] did not have the proper system for handling customer service and inquires,”Varry says. “Looking back four years, our division has gone through radical changes.”

Working at FIU for more than five 14

Daniel Pimentel years, Varry has gained extensive training and real world experience.

“I realized people want answers immediately. My primary interest in making changes in the lives of students was to create a channel, so if students have issues or questions, they get answers as soon as possible,” Varry says.

Daniel Pimentel, GSC class of 2014, like Varry, also takes advantage of the immediacy of technology.

As the marketing coordinator at the University Graduate School, Pimentel informs students about programs, fellowships and other beneficial activities using digital media.

In Pimentel’s role, he is responsible for creating everything visual from brochures for events to pull up banners and tabletop designs for exhibits.

“The GSC program is like a guide for your creative process. The program has taught me things like the market research needed to really guide your advertising expenses and how to use your budget to effectively reach your market,” said Pimentel.

Claudia Serrano, SJMC class of 2012, agrees and is always thinking of creative new ideas as the marketing manager for Intel.

“I would not be able to do my job without technology,” Serrano said.

Born in Cuba, Serrano came to Florida

in 2007. She chose FIU for its advertising program, even though she knew she wanted to work in technology.

“Tech in general and Intel specifically has a really challenging cultural environment to work in -- it’s very exciting,” said Serrano. “Not only are you creating hardware and general stuff, you are working to find out what helps people.”

Serrano said her favorite part of the wide range of Intel products is the critical part they play in powering huge projects throughout the globe.

“It is an ingredient brand that can really make a difference,” she said.

Looking ahead, Serrano is hopeful about the future—especially about the ability to monitor biological statistics on the go.

“I think technology is going to be more about being able to figure out how to help people. That is why you are seeing the trend in wearable devices,” Serrano said.

Serrano herself wears a watch that tracks her sleep and her heart rate.

“Technology is becoming more and more human. I am excited to see that change and I am excited to see it coming. It will only help us all become more efficient and productive.”

Claudia Serrano

SJMC Alumns Join Journalism and STEM

By Amanda Rabines

R

ebecca Burton’s love for marine life is the key reason she chose a career in science communication.

“I grew up really close to the beach and just living so close, it [marine science] was always a passion of mine,” said Burton.

“It was something I was interested in and something I was interested in protecting.”

The beach for her is home, so after learning about Florida’s deteriorating marine ecosystems, Burton was determined to help save it.

“I felt that as a journalist, I had a chance to get the word out there,” said Burton.

In 2012, Burton graduated from Florida International University’s School of Journalism and Mass Communication with a degree in journalism and a minor in marine biology.

T

he Sun-Sentinel is going through a digital revolution, and Anne Vasquez is helping

direct it.

Five years ago, Vasquez was asked to be head of digital management. That meant making the entire Sun-Sentinel newspaper more digital friendly.

“At the time, I knew very little about what it took to program a website,” said Vasquez. “So when I was approached about taking over the digital operation, it was daunting and scary.”

Most of Vasquez’s experience was in print journalism, not digital.

She graduated from SJMC in 1996 and was a reporter for the Miami Herald, a features editor for San Jose Mercury News and is now an associate editor for the Sun-Sentinel.

After being asked to shift her focus from print to digital, Vasquez sought advice from a mentor.

While at SJMC, she wrote for the Beacon and South Florida News Service. Before graduating from FIU, she started her own science blog, called Layman’s Term Media, to gain the right experience in environmental journalism.

“This kind of reporting [health and environmental] was always appealing,” said Burton. “It was more appealing than reporting on only bad news like crime.”

Her blog covers news related to science, health, the environment and technology.

By editing contributing writers in her blog, Burton gained practice in communicating science related news.

“You want to be able to know a little bit of the language scientists speak,” said Burton. “If you don’t know the basics, it will be lost in translation.”

“The advice was: every few years do something that really scares the heck out of you,” said Vasquez. “And going into the digital state really scared the heck out of me.”

But Vasquez was determined to learn.

She remembers feverishly writing notes while listening to digital managers and developers talk about online strategies and multi-screen content.

“There were acronyms and codes,” said Vasquez. “They spoke in a language that I did not understand.”

She says it took her six months before she felt comfortable with the position, and as a result, the Sun-Sentinel’s website is more online friendly than it has ever been before.

“I think in order to move the evolution of digital along, you need someone who understands how to put together a story piece and understands the issues and ethics around it as well,” said Vasquez. “If I were to go back five years ago, I wouldn’t change

Rebecca Burton

Today, Burton is a communications coordinator for the Florida Sea Grant, a program that supports research education around the state to help conserve coastal resources.

“Before I got this job, what helped me get my position now is that I started my own science blog,” said Burton.

Anne Vasquez

my decision at all because I was able to offer my reputation as a journalist.”

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Aquarius, Aquanauts and Life Under the Sea

By Rebekah Keida

Professor Juliet Pinto and alum Bruno Grudny, class of 2014, visit Aquarius.

I

f someone asked me on my first day of classes at FIU if I thought that I would ever meet an astronaut, I would have said, without much hesitation, no. But, thanks to Florida International University and the School of Journalism and Mass Communication, I can say that I have had the pleasure of interviewing Akihiko Hoshide from the Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency, Thomas Pesquet from the European Space Agency, and Jeanette J. Epps and Mark T. Vande Hei from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration—the crew of NASA’s Extreme Environment Mission Operations 18.

Hold on, how is this possible?

Well, it is all due to a one-of-a-kind underwater research lab and reef base called the Aquarius. Located in Islamorada, Florida, the base is an investment that not only intrigues the imagination but also provides an invaluable source of research and observation for both students and the scientific community. FIU acquired the project in 2013.

“It’s something unique in marine science. Nobody else has an undersea laboratory,” says Tom Potts, director of the Aquarius. “FIU is it.”

The base, located roughly five miles off shore and 62 feet underwater on the ocean floor, sounds like science fiction.

It certainly is an amazing acquisition for FIU, marine science researchers, and fans alike. As part of Professor Juliet Pinto’s capstone class, students were allowed to dive down to the facility and speak to personnel on board. For example, Fabien Cousteau, the grandson of the late Jacques Cousteau, recently lived in the Aquarius for 31 days to research the coral reefs and bring attention to challenges facing reefs in a changing climate. SJMC students were able to interact with him while he was underwater via Skype.

Roger Garcia heads the Aquarius mission control. The staff includes around 18 people who do everything from monitor the aquanauts inside of the Aquarius, to public outreach, to planning underwater missions with astronauts.

An aquanaut practices for a spacewalk at Aquarius.

“One of the Photo credit: Bruno Grudny coolest things we do [at Aquarius] is work with NASA Extreme Environment Missions Operations, or NEEMO. We are working with real life astronauts that are bringing state of the art technology that is prototyped to ultimately fly into outer space,” says Potts.

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Those who dive to the Aquarius, better known as aquanauts, can stay under the water for, well, forever. This is possible due to a technique called saturation diving that mixes nitrogen with oxygen in an aquanaut’s air tank and then filters the same mixture inside the reef base. But saturating your body with both nitrogen and oxygen comes with a price. The crew of aquanauts must decompress for over 15 hours before they are able to return to the surface. This can pose a problem in emergency situations. If this protocol is not followed, then it is possible for an aquanaut to get a condition called “the bends”—when nitrogen bubbles left inside the body expand inside the joints of an aquanaut during ascension. The bends can be lethal. Thankfully, the Aquarius is equipped with a Life Support Buoy. The support ships contain a mini decompression chamber that can continue the process until the crew makes it back to the Aquarius mission control, located in Islamorada.

In between NEEMO missions this winter, the team gears up to revamp the base in a project Potts calls the Aquarius challenge.

“There are newer technologies that we can incorporate to increase the capacities and capabilities of what we can do.

It is sort of like Aquarius 2.0 in 2020. It is the next generation of Aquarius,” said Potts.

No matter what it evolves into, the base will continue to inspire at its home on the ocean floor.

“When you dive down to it, you sort of become part of the seascape,” Potts said.

“The fish swim up to the moon pool and you are no longer a visitor, you are a resident.”

MAST @ FIU: High School Students Merge STEM & Journalism

By Katie Lepri

F

or most students, walking into a classroom means no social media and no cell phones. But in MAST @ FIU’s journalism class, Facebook, Twitter and Instagram are allowed, and encouraged, unless it’s during a class lecture.

The journalism class is the creative multimedia hub of campus and is responsible for producing a digital newspaper every weeks and yearbook for the STEM focused high school.

The class, taught by language teacher Arleen Senas, is part of a larger vision for MAST @ FIU in an effort to offer similar classes that standard high schools have.

Matthew Welker, MAST @ FIU’s principal, foresees the class as becoming an integral part of the curriculum and potentially a requirement for all students.

“I see us creating an interest thread within the fabric of what we’re doing that represents something along environmental journalism that would allow these young people to continue advancing their words as well as their images,” said Welker.

In its second year, Senas’ journalism class has approximately 33 students, a mixture of ninth- and 10th-graders. Their goal: produce a new edition of their digital paper, The Marine Echoes, every two weeks with stories they pitch and produce.

According to the class’s Twitter account, their mission is to “educate, inform and provide information on initiatives, events and programs that support the mission, vision and goals of Miami-Dade County Public Schools.”

For students to enroll in the class, which is offered every other day for an hour and a half, they must be in good academic standing and express an interest in journalism.

The class is set up like a quasi-newsroom. During each school year, Senas assigns her students leadership roles like editor-in-chief, managing editor and section

said. “This is an opportunity to share that.”

With the SJMC’s help, Senas has sculpted the class to be an introduction to journalism, stressing skills such as inter-

“I was really excited to be part of an actual newspaper” editors to help with production.

The rest of the students are the paper’s staff writers. What they report is up to them.

“I want them to feel empowered to write about something that interests them,” Senas said. “For the most part, I let them choose. If it’s appropriate, I’ll tell them to go with it.”

When Skyler Odin, 15, found out the class was being offered her freshman year, she immediately signed up. To her, getting involved in the elective was a no brainer.

“I was really excited to be part of an actual newspaper,” Odin said. “It’s one of the most diverse and fun classes there is.”

The class, she said, has taught her skills that she can apply outside of journalism like how to communicate, work well with others and respect the chain of command.

“Those are all attributes that I can carry with me,” said Odin.

In year two, Senas’ class paired with SJMC’s Dr. Robert Gutsche and his students. Their first collaboration was for Eyes on the Rise, a grant funded project to raise awareness about sea level rise.

“We’ve been very lucky to receive a lot of support from donors, support through FIU, from the community,” Gutsche

viewing, writing for a newspaper, and editing content.

“I focus a lot on their writing skills because that’s my strength,” Senas said.

“It’s exposure to a lot of different things, so they’re able to find their interests and where their strengths lie.”

More than anything, she attempts to instill a sense of responsibility in her students, so that they feel compelled to report even when they’re not in class.

For Odin and her classmates, the journalism class is the rare opportunity to do something different.

“I think everyone can find a little piece in journalism that they’d enjoy,” said Odin.

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Student Highlights Spanish Language Journalism

Broadcast Media

Juan Camilo Gomez is a 2014 graduate of the Spanish-language master’s program in journalism. Currently, he is an anchor for the morning radio show “Caracol 1260.” He alworks as an online producer for El Nuevo Herald. In April 2014, Juan’s international team at W Radio International received the Corporation for Public Broadcasting Award and the Silver Microphone from the New York Festival Radio Awards, for its special titled “JFK: 50 years after.” These recognitions are no surprise to the SLJ program faculty: While a student at SJMC, Juan received the Excellence Award from the SJMC faculty.

Michael Collado, a broadcast media major, has interned at postproduction facility Upstairs Uptempo, has had several projects admitted to the FIU Media Arts Film Festival and has done work for the Miami Museum of Art + Design.

As a self-proclaimed television aficionado, he started his own TV blog, NoWhiteNoise, where he publishes opinion and news pieces, including several interviews with TV professionals, such as one with the cast of ABC’s “Scandal.” Sean “P. Diddy” Combs once tweeted a link to an article Michael wrote on the Oxford English Dictionary adding “LOL”, “OMG” and other Internet speak to its lexicon. Currently, he serves as a videographer forYouth M.O.V.E. Miami, a nonprofit organization dedicated to helping youth and young adults with mental health and substance abuse experiences.

Public Relations Cristina Capote is a current public relations student set to graduate this spring. She has been working in public relations for two years, beginning at radio Disney in Miami in October 2012 as a cast member and a promotions assistant. In September 2014, Cristina began an internship at Allied Integrated Marketing, a PR group that promotes films and entertainment. Her role at Allied is pitching, networking and working movie screenings to promote pre-released films. Not only is Cristina making strides in her career outside of the classroom, but she is also sharpening her skills within the classroom. In Professor Margo Berman’s Radio-TV advertising course last semester, Cristina handled social media for both,The South Florida Contenders, a softball travel academy and Monster Buddy, a pillow company created to help kids sleep.

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Global Strategic Communications Donny Boulanger is a current graduate student in the management track of the Global Strategic Communications program. His focus is on corporate social responsibility communication, and he would like to work in the technology industry. He is on the Dean’s Student Advisory Council, assists with development in the SJMC Dean’s office, is president of the GSC Graduate Society and currently works as the supervisor for field operations at the Department of Parking and Transportation at FIU’s Biscayne Bay Campus. He

received his bachelor’s degree in economics from the University of South Florida in his hometown of Tampa. Donny has worked as a tax process specialist for corporations and partnerships at Price Waterhouse Coopers and as a specialist at Apple Retail. Donny is a classically trained percussionist and loves playing hand drums.

Journalism Serena Jimenez, SJMC’14, graduated with a degree in journalism. She is the interim series producer for “Art Loft,” a broadcast program that showcases the arts in South Florida. Serena is also the field trip producer for “KidVision VPK,” a professional development tool for voluntary pre-kindergarten teachers that offers virtual field trips, coordinated lesson plans and in-service hours/certifications. Her duties include location and subject scouting, logistics, editing, script writing, interviewing and following up with keeping everything in line. Serena also does freelance shooting and editing for WPBT2.

Advertising Adrienne Kanter is a current advertising student set to graduate this spring.

A high school graduate from the Design and Architecture Senior High, Adrienne has a strong background in art and design.

Before SJMC, she opened up an art gallery named Studio Kanter in Fort Lauderdale. During that time, she handled gallery Continued on page 22

CLASS NOTES

Cristela Guerra, Class of 2007

Cristela Guerra is an award-winning government reporter for News Press. She is known for her project “A Spark of Hope: One Family’s Journey,” where she reported on the story of a child, suffering from mitochondrial disease. The series went on to win the prestigious 2014 Regional and National Edward R. Murrow Awards for News Series, among other awards.

“Initially, I got into journalism because I wanted to change the world. Now, I think I do it because I want to understand the world and to bring awareness to issues that aren’t discussed enough,” Guerra says. “Ultimately, it comes down to explaining why this story is important to someone.”

Stephen Nuñez, Class of 2013

Only two months following his graduation, Stephen Nuñez landed a coveted multimedia account executive position for the Miami New Times. He has been servicing the newspaper for 10 months. As an account executive, Nuñez fulfills advertising

campaigns and digital marketing for local and national businesses. One of his favorite parts of the job is being in the middle of the “artistic renaissance” that is occurring in Miami. But more than anything, he says he enjoys knowing that SJMC helped him grow into the person he is today.

“I loved my time at FIU, and I look forward to being involved for the rest of my life. There’s a lot to come from FIU,” Nuñez says. “I wear my college ring every day with pride because I’m a Golden Panther.”

and gave me the confidence to take that big step into the “real world,” she said. “What started as walking into the real world soon became flying all over the globe. Having a career that allows me to travel and learn fuels my desire to grow both professionally and as a person.”

Oliver Macdonald, Class of 2011

Victoria Marichal, Class of 2013

Victoria Marichal has had quite an accomplished year since graduation. The advertising major, Class of 2013, works for Artex Productions as its full-time account executive and production manager. She recently traveled with the company for four months filming across Central and South America and the Caribbean for the resort giant, Iberostar. The project included more than 900 videos in five languages for 32 resorts, and Victoria supervised all of them.

While at FIU, Marichal was the president of AdFed (advertising students club), which she revamped. She moved on to become the president of Ad 2 Miami, an organization of professionals ages 32 and under. Marichal now sits on the American Advertising Awards committee, managing the student portion of Miami for the national advertising competition.

“Graduation was not only a milestone.

It inspired my siblings to go back to school

Oliver Macdonald has been a creative all-star since graduating FIU in December 2011. He went on to attend the Miami Ad School and graduated two years later.

He had four different internships while at the Miami Ad School, which includes SapientNitro, Mullen, Alma and Razorfish.

Macdonald earned numerous advertising awards, including the Razorfish Ideathon, the Miami Ad School Golden Paw (three time winner) and was a semi-finalist at the 2012 Adobe Design Achievement Awards.

Currently, he is working at DDB in San Francisco as a junior art director. He describes himself as a “curious technological geek”. When asked about one important piece of advice he has for SJMC students, Macdonald says, “I can’t stress enough how important the grammar program is at the SJMC. Even though I’m an art director, having such a solid foundation in writing has definitely helped me both as a student at Miami Ad School and as a junior creative at DDB California.”

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class notes

Lissette Campos, Class of 1989

The five-time Emmy award winning journalist, Lissette Campos, is the director of community affairs for ABC Action News.

Her work has been recognized by the National Headliners’ Awards, Society of Professional Journalists and the Florida Associated Press. In 2009, Campos launched the nationally recognized “Taking Action Against Domestic Violence” campaign and under her leadership, the awareness campaign has helped increase calls to the statewide domestic violence hotline by 77 percent. The National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences’ Suncoast Chapter honored her with the prestigious Silver Circle Award in 2013 for 25 years in communications and journalism.

She is a strong believer in leadership and empowerment programs for young women and working moms and says her most “important role of all” is parenthood.

Sury Beck, Class of 2007

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Sury Beck enjoys her job at the Hyatt Regency in Scottsdale, Arizona, where she has worked for six years as an event planner. One of her proudest moments was when she helped coordinate transportation for the Make-A-Wish Foundation and could take a boy who was gravely ill to his first baseball game.

“I love what I do. If you don’t have a passion for what you do and you work in hospitality, you are in the wrong field,” she said. “It’s a lot of hours, work and multitasking.You have to love what you do.”

Isadora Rangel, Class of 2010

Isadora Rangel has been working for the Scripps Treasure Coast Newspapers in Stuart, Florida, since 2012. She started as an intern, was soon hired as an entertainment and features reporter and later taken on the position of beat reporter for topics relating to the local Port St. Lucie government. Now, Rangel is the paper’s political reporter. Rangel covers Florida legislature, local politics and congressional and gubernatorial races. Rangel likes to analyze political trends. “It is very exciting for me. At the end of the day, I know that I am doing something meaningful,” Rangel said.

Ana Isabel Noboa, Class of 2010 As a student, Ana Isabel Noboa was already on her way to becoming successful in the communication industry. She was working part time for Telemundo 51 while attending school. After graduation, Noboa continued to work at Telemundo 51 as a segment producer and associate news producer. Last year, Noboa got some exciting news when she found out she landed a job with NBC 6 as the weekend morning news producer and writer/associate producer during the week for the morning newscast.

Noboa has a piece of advice when it comes to the journey of being successful: “Don’t lose sight of who you are while on the road of what you want to be.”

Manuel Garcia, Class of 1990 “I am empire building,” says Manuel Garcia , editor at Naples Daily News, Pulitzer-prize winning journalist and Florida International University alum. He was just appointed onto the first-ever social media panel for the 2014 gubernatorial debate at Broward College in Broward County, Florida. He is also currently on the board of both the American Society of News Editors and the Florida Society of News Editors. Garcia has won multiple awards with the Miami Herald Media Company, first as the managing editor at the Miami Herald and then as the executive editor of El Nuevo Herald.

Awards include Pulitzer Prizes for his reporting of fraud in the Miami mayoral election in 1999 and his breaking news about the return of Elian Gonzalez to his father in Cuba in 2001. Garcia also played an instrumental role in discovering a flaw in criminal convictions that altered Florida law in 2006.

Faculty Notes

Prof. Margo Berman’s latest work, tactikPAK™, is a digital library of learning, which she invented and patented. This interactive series will be released as ebooks and accompanying apps. As mobile mentors, they are peppered with whimsical illustrations and short quizzes to make learning fun. The first tactikPAK™, Copywriting (app and ebook), was released in early November, followed by Advertising, Creativity, Design, P re s e n t at i o n , Promotion, Public Relations, Resume and Writing.

Prof. Berman’s collective research from books, webinars and CDs to eBooks and apps are independent as well as interrelated works. Currently, she is writing her 14th book, which will focus on advertising campaign strategies.

Dr. Susan Jacobson is a member of the Eyes on the Rise team that won the Online News Association curriculum challenge grant. She is working with the FIU Geographic Information System Department to develop an app regarding impacts of sea level rise on local homes and businesses. She is also co-teaching a new class, WebGIS for Journalists, with the FIU-GIS department. With Dr. Robert Gutsche, she presented an AEJMC paper, “The Digital Animation of Literary Journalism.” She also presented another paper, “Open Media or Echo Chamber: The Use of Links in Audience Discussions on the Facebook Pages of Partisan News Organizations,” at ICA.

21

The center also launched a Communication Leadership Power Program, where students who attend five webinars or seminars of the center over the academic year will earn a certificate for their work.

SJMC professors Dr. Robert Gutsche, Jr. and Lilliam Martinez-Bustos, and Digital Media Studies student Consuelo Naranjo collaborated on the paper ’Now we can talk’: The role of culture in journalistic boundary work during the boycott of Puerto Rico’s La Comay. The paper was accepted for publication in the journal Journalism Practice.

“I am so excited about this collaboration and what it means for SJMC: that faculty and undergraduate students can produce research for top journals because of the environment and support that SJMC provides,” Gutsche said.

Martinez-Bustos, who worked for two decades as a broadcast journalist, said, “I had done research for news and documentaries, but this was different and gave me a different perspective on journalism.”

Dean Emeritus and Professor Lillian Lodge Kopenhaver led the Leadership Webinar Series of the Lillian Lodge Kopenhaver Center for the Advancement of Women in Communication. The first webinar featured SJMC Assistant Professor Susan Jacobson discussing women and technology. Gabriela Alcantara-Diaz, president of GAD Marketing Communications, Inc., discussed “How to Build Meaningful Consumer Brand Relationships in Today’s Diversified Marketplace.” November featured Dianne Lynch, president of Stephens College, who discussed the women in leadership positions.

In addition to her teaching, a large portion of Professor Lynn Farber’s time is spent as an adviser to the Public Relations Student Society of America (PRSSA.) In September, two of PRSSA’s members were awarded large scholarships from the Miami PRSA chapter. On Oct. 10, eight members went to a national conference in Washington, D.C. In addition to PRSSA, Professor Farber chairs the DJMC Scholarship Committee, where she sits on the Communications Week committee as well as several other university committees. Her favorite time is spent with her students.

At the International Media Center (IMC), Professor Mercedes Vigon continues strengthening Latin American journalism and civic engagement by working directly with foreign journalists in a virtual newsroom, as well as conducting seminars in areas such as social or investigative journalism.

On the academic front, the IMC is spearheading an effort to analyze the results of two recently created databases. Results will be used in an interdisciplinary effort to write a book for their Latino Issues portraits. After finishing her documentary about an Afro-Colombian community that converted to Islam in Buenaventura, Colombia, Professor Vigon is

Faculty Notes

working on the distribution phase. Professor Vigon returned from a meeting with the Foreign Editor Circle to discuss strategies to keep correspondents safer; other service activities include advising a very active NAHJ student chapter.

Dr. Maria-Elena Villar is a founder of the Ministers’ Health Project of the Minority Men’s Health initiative at Hampton University. She is leading this project with Prof.

Wayne Dawkins, her colleague from the Scripps School of Journalism and Mass Communication at Hampton University. The project involves a research component to assess how African American and Hispanic ministers see their role in maintaining their health and the health of their congregations. Second, she is working with University of Miami gaming professor Lien Tran and doctoral student Jessica Wendorf to develop a game to raise awareness about child sexual exploitation, and the challenges faced by exploited children. Dr. Villar also continues her ongoing work in strategic communication for stigma reduction and health promotion among diverse audiences.

Dr. Weirui Wang continues her research regarding social media and health communication this academic year. She has been working with Dr. Yu Liu on a project examining public discussion of depression in the Chinese social media Weibo, focusing on the impacts of stigmatizing or supporting people living with depression. Another ongoing 22

project, co-authored with Dr. Maria Elena Villar, focuses on comparing the relationship between social dominance orientation and HIV stigma for Hispanic and non-Hispanic white populations. By understanding the cultural antecedents of HIV stigma, they develop a more culturally competent approach to reduce stigma.

Dr. David J. Park is working on a number of research papers, including: an “ecologically just” model of advertising to find renewable substitutes for harmful commodity production processes; how recent social media legislation is affecting employee and job applicant privacy, another comparing TV and Internet use among African-American students, which he co-authored with Dr. Maria Elena Villar and a comparative paper examining media coverage of the Fukushima nuclear disaster, with professors. Juliet Pinto and Weirui Wang. Dr. Park spoke at an event featuring various European diplomats cosponsored by the SJMC and Miami-Florida European Union Center for Excellence.

Adrienne Kanter continued from page 18 management, public relations and advertising. Her last show featuring Erika King of the Miami Heat received ample media coverage, including channel 10. Adrienne is now the newest intern at In House Ideas, a result driven, strategic consulting firm dedicated to creating the pathway to success for clients. There, she has been working on prestigious accounts, such as Art Basel and the World Presidents’ Organization.

This is in addition to the real-world clientele that she works on at FIU with the CREATivators – the brainchild of Margo Berman. Adrienne is juggling the workforce as well as preparing to attend law school.

Communicating Wellness continued from page 13

“Prior to working at Memorial Healthcare System, I was working at the Sun Sentinel. I decided I wanted to be working in a field that had more of an impact on people’s daily life. So I transitioned over to Memorial,” Waskiewicz said.

Waskiewicz worked at Memorial as a coordinator over the hospitality house, a children’s hospital akin to the Ronald McDonald House, while obtaining her master’s degree from SJMC. “It was challenging [to do both], but good,” Waskiewicz said. “I was able to apply a lot of what I learned.”

Currently, Waskiewicz serves as the Senior Project Manager at Sylvester Comprehensive Cancer Center and feels that her SJMC degree helps her perform her job effectively.

“It’s definitely been a help to me and in all the roles I’ve been in,” Waskiewicz said.

“It’s been a good background having that communications degree because so much of my job is really communicating our directors top mission message to audiences on a daily basis.”

Waskiewicz feels that her work as project manager helps, in a small way, find the cure for cancer.

“I’m not a scientist, I’m never going to work in a lab and cure cancer,” Waskiewicz said. “But if I can help facilitate the research of scientists that will cure cancer [then] I feel like I’m having an indirect effect towards finding a cure and raising awareness for cancer in the future.”

Although Waskiewicz works in the health field – a field not often occupied by communication majors – she loves what she does for a living.

“I love what I do because I was never the little girl that knew what she wanted to be when she grew up,”Waskiewicz said. “All I knew since a very long time ago was that I just wanted to make the world better.”

You don’t have to know all the answers, just how to get them.

Dial 3-1-1

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