JMC School students check in for the Opportunities Fair last week. | Photo by Maya Smith. 

Students stopped by last week’s Opportunities Fair to meet with campus media organizations and student clubs. If you missed the event or want to get in touch with any of these groups, please let us know. You can visit the Dean’s office in 200 Stauffer-Flint Hall, stop by the advising office in 117 Stauffer-Flint, or email jschool@ku.edu.

Join JMC 201 for movie nights this semester: This semester's JMC 201 class, Journalism in the Movies, will be watching journalism-related movies all semester on Monday nights. Everyone is welcome to join for the movies, which start at 6:30 p.m. in Stauffer-Flint 100. On Monday, Jan. 26, is the Oscar-winning “Spotlight” from 2017. 

Meeting for Germany study abroad opportunity: The KU Department of Communication Studies is hosting two information sessions about a summer study abroad program in Erfurt, Germany. The first is an in-person session on Monday, Feb. 2, from 5-6 p.m. in Bailey Hall 401. There is a Zoom option available on Tuesday, Feb. 3, from 3-4 p.m. To attend the Zoom session, you must email ashley.muddiman@ku.edu or jmhunter@ku.edu for the Zoom link and password. Students in the program take two communication-focused courses taught in English and enjoy a summer living in a charming German city. 

Study abroad in the United Kingdom: The deadline to apply for the Global Sport Management in the United Kingdom study abroad program is Feb. 1. Program information and details on how to apply are available here. 

Apply to represent your JMC School concentration on Technology Committee: This service leadership opportunity is a great way to get involved with student leadership in the school and help improve technology resources and training at the school. Email halawrenz@ku.edu and include a short paragraph on why you would be an excellent candidate. Please include the name of a professor in your concentration who will vouch for your leadership potential. 

KC Ad Club Foundation scholarships available: The $2,500 scholarship supports educational costs for sophomores and juniors interested in advertising. Scholarship recipients also receive industry mentorship with a Kansas City advertising professional and KC Ad Club membership with complimentary access to all events. The deadline to apply for the scholarship is Feb. 28. The scholarship application form can be found here.

KAB accepting entries for Student Broadcast Excellence Awards: The program offers an opportunity to showcase student talent and recognize exceptional work. The entry deadline is 11:59 p.m., Monday, Feb. 23. More details.

Nominations open for Dr. Ian Punnett Media Educator Award: The annual honor recognizes exceptional college educators who have made significant contributions to media education and inspired the next generation of media professionals. The honoree will be announced and celebrated at the KAB Student Broadcast and Sports Seminar. Nominations are due March 1. 

Hanbo Liu (top left), Samuel Muzhingi (top right), Beth Taylor (bottom left) and Yunwen Wang (bottom right). 

Doctoral students Hanbo Liu, Samuel Muzhingi, and Beth Taylor, together with Assistant Professor Yunwen Wang, had their study “From Problem to Presence: A Comparative Analysis of ADHD Frames on TikTok” accepted to the ICA Annual Conference.

Professor Stephen Wolgast, Knight Chair in Audience and Community Engagement in News, joined an international group of researchers to help create a worldwide database of legal harassment against journalists. Headed by Dr. Lucia Mesquita of the Losófona University in Lisbon, Portugal, the project is compiling examples of how governments and the powerful use legal tools to threaten or silence the press. One recent example is the FBI raiding the home of a Washington Post reporter and seizing her work computers and her smart watch. Other examples include civil suits that use the law to file frivolous cases. The other primary investigators are at Utrecht University in the Netherlands and the University of New South Wales in Australia. They plan to have initial results published in an online database by the end of the year. 

Stephen Wolgast

Associate Professor Carol Holstead judged the Illustrated Story category for the Design, Illustration and Photography competition for the American Society of Magazine Editors. Judges are invited to participate. The competition is the most prestigious for American magazines. Holstead has judged ASME competitions, including the National Magazine Awards, since 2010. 

Assistant Professor Yunwen Wang and external collaborator of JMC School's Computational Health and Risk Communication Group, Danny Yihan Jia (Boston U; first author) published their research, "Endless scrolling: Predictors of procrastinatory short-form video use and its effects on stress and sleep," in Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking. The article reveals links between procrastinatory short-form video use and lowered college student well-being. 

Congratulations to Hana Khan, who successfully defended her thesis on Nov. 19. Her thesis, "Prompting for Progress: Exploring Prompt Engineering Across Education, Journalism, and Computer Science," explores how prompt engineering is defined, applied, and used across these fields. It argues that prompting is an important skill for developing students' critical thinking and that AI literacy and prompt engineering should be integrated throughout journalism curricula. Doing so, it argues, will help students learn to use generative AI systems effectively and ethically. In her work, Khan developed a novel method of using the generative AI tool NotebookLM for organizing and analyzing source material. Khan was guided by the following committee members: Professor Yvonnes Chen and Associate Professor Alyssa Appelman, and Associate Professor Doug Ward, thesis chair.

Professor Teri Finneman has started working with the Pinedale Roundup in Wyoming to bring in more revenue as part of her Reviving Rural News book initiatives. Finneman will also be the featured speaker at Museum After Hours at the Kansas Museum of History on June 12.

Breakfast for Dinner at the Dole Institute Jan. 27 at 5:30 p.m.: Free speech on college campuses has been a contentious topic for many years, and groups from both sides of the political aisle have criticized the campus environment for not welcoming dissenting opinions. Student advisory board coordinator Abbie Clements will be in conversation with the Council of Independent Colleges' Jacqueline Pfeffer Merrill and First Amendment rights lawyer Max Kautsch about the value of having a forum for disagreements, and how campus communities can work towards building productive environments for free speech.

Internship and student jobs

Job opportunities

The JBar is open! Come visit us from 9 a.m.-4 p.m. Monday through Thursday and 9 a.m. to 12 p.m. on Friday. We can help you with Adobe, WordPress and offer suggestions to help improve any project you are working on. New to JBar? We are in the Clarkson Gallery on the first floor of Stauffer-Flint Hall. 

JSchoolTeach already has a few fun workshops on our calendar. Join us for Social Media Graphics to Build your Portfolio and From Idea to Identity — Logo & Brand Kit Basics. Both events have an in-person and Zoom option. Sign up here. 

JMC School alums Jayson Jenks and CJ Moore were both featured in The Athletic’s list of memorable stories in its 10 years of existence. Jenks is the co-author of the story “‘The Most Toxic Environment I’ve ever been a part of’: Inside Urban Meyer’s disastrous year with Jaguars,” and the author of “Wait, NFL players eat how many Uncrustables?”. Moore is the author of a piece profiling former KU basketball player K.J. Adams, “‘I didn’t know, Mom’: The force that drives the most improved player in college basketball.”

View the full list. 

Alumni Job Updates

Scott Reinardy
Interim Dean

Mugur Geana
Interim Associate Dean
Research & Faculty Development

Lisa McLendon
Interim Associate Dean
Student Success

Calendar

William Allen White School of Journalism & Mass Communications
journalism.ku.edu

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