May 2, 2011, Greencastle, Ind. — Dick Johnson, news reporter and anchor for Chicago's WMAQ-TV/NBC 5 and 1976 graduate of DePauw University, will serve as master of ceremonies at a Friday awards luncheon presented by the Illinois chapter of the National School Public Relations Association. The event, which will take place at the Park Ridge Country Club, is noted in the Chicago Daily Herald.

Read more here.

An Emmy and DuPont-Columbia award winning broadcast journalist, Johnson is a nearly 30-year veteran of Chicago TV news. His assignments have included covering the assassination attempt on President Ronald Reagan from Air Force Two with then-Vice-President George H.W. Bush, the return of the Iranian hostages at West Point, and election campaigns of every kind, from president to mayor. In 2004, the newsman made a cameo appearance in the movie Barbershop 2.

Johnson joined NBC5 in the Fall of 2002 and  is currently Sunday evening news anchor, general assignment reporter and backup weeknight anchor.  He previously worked at Chicago's WLS-TV, KDFW-TV in Dallas and Indianapolis' WTHR-TV. The journalist serves on the advisory board of DePauw's Pulliam Center for Contemporary Media.

A December 24, 2010 story noted Johnson and several DePauw connections.

May 2, 2011, Greencastle, Ind. — Julia Ann Crawley Shumaker, a 1933 graduate of DePauw University and member of the faculty during the 1940s, passed away Friday, April 29, in Greencastle. She was 98 years old.

Born in Greencastle on November 4, 1912, Shumaker graduated from Greencastle High School. She received her B.A. degree from DePauw University in 1933 and her M.A. from the University of Illinois in 1936.

A second-generation educator, Shumaker  taught Latin, Spanish, French and English at both the high school and university levels. Her career began at the Indiana Soldiers' and Sailors' Children's Home, where she taught from 1933 to 1939. During the 1940-41 school year, she was on the faculty at Ursuline Academy in Louisville, Kentucky, before returning to her college alma mater to join the Romance languages department at DePauw.

After her 1947 marriage to Arthur W. Shumaker '34, professor of English at DePauw, Shumaker continued to teach part-time at DePauw until 1956 and also tutored students in her home. From 1965 until her retirement in 1979, she taught Spanish and English for the Greencastle Community School Corporation.

She was preceded in death by her husband, who passed away in 2000.

Julia Shumaker was a generous supporter of numerous historic preservation groups, including the National Trust for Historic Preservation, the Historic Preservation Society of Putnam County, Historic Landmarks Foundation of Indiana and the Putnam County Museum.

On June 11, 2005, Shumaker was honored by her sorority, Delta Zeta, with the Ionic Column for her longtime service to the organization (seen in photo at right).

A full obituary is available at the website of Greencastle's Banner Graphic.

May 3, 2011, Greencastle, Ind. —Heather Unruh, evening news anchor at Boston's WCVB-TV and 1989 graduate of DePauw University, is among 100 individuals who will be honored at a June 1 gala benefiting the Massachusetts General Hospital Cancer Center. "The fab fete at the Westin Boston Waterfront, co-chaired by Jonathan and Patti Kraft, will honor 100 people who have made strides in the fight against cancer," reports the Boston Herald.  The newspaper notes that actor Matt Damon is also on the list, along with  American Idol also-ran David Archuleta."

Access the item here.

The event's website notes that Unruh "has raised awareness of lung cancer and become a potent advocate for lung cancer education and research. A disease stigmatized by its strong link with smoking, Heather has educated her large viewing audience in the complexities of this disease, the nation's number one cancer killer and a disease that also affects nonsmokers. Heather has received numerous awards from the American Cancer Society and Uniting Against Lung Cancer for her compelling portrayals of patients with lung cancer."

According to Jeffrey Engelman, M.D., Ph.D., "Using her deep understanding of the disease and her great gifts as a communicator, Heather has had a profound and positive impact on the well-being of her audience and transformed public perception of this disease and its victims."

Learn more at the event's website, or in this previous article.

Heather Unruh anchors the early- and late-evening newscasts at WCVB, where she has worked since June 2001 and interned as a DePauw senior.

May 3, 2011, Greencastle, Ind. — DePauw University senior Janelle Arita has been selected the Southern Collegiate Athletic Conference (SCAC) women's tennis player of the year for the second consecutive year, while her coach, Scott Riggle, has been named the conference's women's coach of the year for the fourth straight season. The Tigers, ranked #17 in NCAA Division III, won the conference championship for the fourth consecutive year.

"Arita, a senior from Mililani, Hawaii, posted a 22-8 singles record (88-24 in her career) and is currently ranked third in the Central region in singles play," notes the SCAC's announcement. "A three time all-American, Arita has posted a 26-7 doubles record (91-28 in her career) this season with teammate and all-SCAC performer Kelly Gebert. In the winter, Arita posted a 2-4 overall record (singles/doubles) at the 2011 Intercollegiate Tennis Association (ITA) Division III Women's Indoor National Championship to help the Tigers to a seventh-place finish."

Arita, who has won ten straight singles matches, was featured in the April 20 edition of the Honolulu Star-Advertiser.

Riggle has now been named the SCAC's top women's tennis coach for seven of the last nine years. "His 17th-ranked Tigers earned their fourth straight SCAC title after defeating 19th-ranked Sewanee, 7-2, in the 2011 SCAC championship match. Riggle has compiled a 195-77 record in 11 seasons at DePauw, including this year’s 13-8 mark, and has led the Tigers to seven consecutive NCAA Tournament appearances."

Read more here.

The Tigers wrap up the regular season on Saturday, May 7, with a Noon match against Washington University at the Blackstock Courts. Learn more at the team's official online page.

May 3, 2011, Greencastle, Ind. — The DePauw University Band will present its Student Conductors Concert this Friday evening, May 6, at 7:30 p.m. in Kresge Auditorium, located within DePauw's Green Center for the Performing Arts.  Six School of Music students will guest conduct the ensemble in eight works for symphonic band and six student musicians from local high schools will join in the performance. 

DePauw music majors Katherine Blakey, Ariel Detwiler, Renata Dworak, Bradley King, Andrew Muth, and Orlando Ramirez were selected by audition for this opportunity to conduct the University Band. 

"Our School of Music students strive to become well-rounded musicians, and the University Band is proud to offer this chance to showcase these six talented musicians as conductors," says Craig Paré, professor of music and conductor of the Band. "In addition, six local high school musicians have been joining us for rehearsals."

Trombonists Rachael Campbell (North Putnam High School) and Keith Cassida (Cloverdale H.S.), hornist Michael Walters (Cloverdale H.S.), percussionist Michael Jackson (Cloverdale H.S), tubist Michael Zuver (North Putnam H.S.), and Bret Huber (North Putnam H.S.) on euphonium, have attended rehearsals at DePauw University and will join the University Band in its Friday performance.  (photo, l-r: Andrew Muth, Katherine Blakey, Orlando Ramirez, Renee Dworak, Bradley King, Ariel Detwiler)

"It is a privilege to work with these young high school musicians," states Dr. Paré. "They bring enthusiasm, energy, and a great interest in learning to our work together.  I would like to thank their band directors, William Cole from Cloverdale and John Pinson from North Putnam, for their support and encouragement of their students' participation.”

The concert repertoire will include First Suite in E-flat by Gustav Holst, Nitro and Cajun Folk Songs II by Frank Ticheli, Festivo by Edward Gregson, Ye Banks and Braes O’Bonnie Doon by Percy Grainger, O Magnum Mysterium by Morten Lauridsen, Toccata by Girolamo Frescobaldi, and Festival Prelude by Alfred Reed.
 
The performance is presented free of charge and is open to the public. Those attending the performance are asked, if possible, to bring one non-perishable food item as admission.  All donations will go to the Putnam County Emergency Food Pantry.

Founded in 1884, the DePauw University School of Music is one of the nation's oldest private institutions for post-secondary music instruction and the longest-running in Indiana. Learn more here.

May 3, 2011, Greencastle, Ind. — The possible release of photos and even video from the U.S. raid that killed Osama bin Laden -- and how those images should be used -- is analyzed in a column by the Poynter Institute's Al Tompkins. "Former Washington Post editor R.B. Brenner (and now Pulliam Visiting Professor of Journalism at DePauw University) told me, 'We (journalists) normally have a skittishness when we show a dead body. You have to consider the size and placement of a photograph.' Brenner said, 'I tend to believe in my gut and experience [that] when it comes to showing dead bodies I opt for smaller and not color.' And he said he would most likely choose to place such an image on an inside page, not on a cover." (top photo: R.B. Brenner; below right: Bob Steele)

Brenner adds, "It is a given that it is incredibly newsworthy. As you can see from the reaction of the American people, there is incredible emotion, almost a cathartic emotion to his death. Because the reaction is more of a primal level reaction, people want to see his body."

Also quoted is Bob Steele, Distinguished Visiting Professor of Journalism Ethics at DePauw and Phyllis W. Nicholas Director of the University's Janet Prindle Institute for Ethics. "I would think about verification and accountability," says Steele, a noted media ethicist and 1969 graduate of DePauw. "We are hearing specifics that he was shot in the head and that is how he died. There is an argument by some that he was assassinated as opposed to killed in a firefight. A photo adds one more piece to a large puzzle in helping us figure out what happened. Then there is the journalistic role of accountability. No matter what one believes about the right or wrong of what took place, the administration, the CIA and the military should be accountable for what happened."

Dr. Steele adds, "Absent seeing the photograph we don't have the opportunity to look at it and say, ‘This does not make sense.’ "

Tompkins writes, "But whatever choice you make about whether or not to use the graphic images, explain to the public why you made that decision, Steele advised."

Access the complete essay by clicking here.

Located in St. Petersburg, Florida, the Poynter Institute is dedicated to teaching and inspiring journalists and media leaders.

Robert M. Steele also serves as Nelson Poynter Scholar for Journalism Values at the Poynter Institute. was quoted last week in a Los Angeles Times report on Donald Trump.  Details can be found in this article.

May 3, 2011, Greencastle, Ind. — John Herrick, a 2010 graduate of DePauw University, has joined New Media Broadcasters, a group of four radio stations in Havre, Montana.  Herrick's broadcast work for the outlets includes play-by-play of sporting events. (photo: Herrick, who worked on HDNet's telecast of the 2010 Monon Bell Classic, with announcers Kenny Rice and Paul Maguire)

"I’m definitely excited to just do everything, to just learn everything about all the facets that go into a radio station," says Herrick, who was a communication major at DePauw, where he was a prominent voice on student station WGRE. "That’s the great thing about working at a small station like this, you become versatile and multi-faceted. You do everything from news and sports to running a board."

Last month, Herrick's work at WGRE earned him an Indiana Associated Press Broadcasters Award.

Learn more about John Herrick in this previous story.

May 4, 2011, Greencastle, Ind. — The recent budget deal that led to $38 billion in spending cuts and averted a government shutdown had a serious flaw, in the view of Lee Hamilton, "the whole process got things exactly backward." In a newspaper op-ed, the veteran statesman and 1952 graduate of DePauw University writes, "The way Congress used to work, budgets were crafted by a series of committees holding public hearings and debating separate appropriation bills. There was the occasional last-minute surprise, of course, but for the most part the process was organized and transparent. Our elected representatives knew what was coming and had the opportunity to shape it, and the American people knew whom to hold accountable for what."

Hamilton continues, "This budget deal, on the other hand, was put together behind closed doors by a handful of people striving to meet a doomsday deadline, handed off to unelected staff and a few legislators to work out the details, and then presented to the bulk of Congress for a take-it-or-leave-it vote. In some instances, no one has admitted responsibility for last-minute maneuvers that changed established policy; they emerged from the black box of negotiations as if untouched by human hands. Call me old-fashioned, but I fail to see either the 'representative' or the 'democracy' parts of our representative democracy at work here."

Lawmakers didn't complain about being excluded from the process, the Democrat notes, saving their gripes for what the package contained. Of the "seat-of-the-pants style of legislating," Hamilton asserts, "This is no way to run a country, let alone a democracy."

He concludes, "There is an answer to all this, and it’s a return to the procedure for crafting budgets that Congress developed over many decades of experience -- committee hearings on individual spending bills, floor action  allowing for an orderly amendment process, open conference committees and then final votes in which every member knows precisely what he or she is voting on. That Congress has allowed itself to move so far from that time-honored process raises deeply disturbing questions about this government's ability to govern."

Access the complete essay at the website of the Appeal-Democrat of Marysville, California.
 
Lee H. Hamilton served 34 years in the U.S. House of Representatives, co-chaired the 9/11 Commission and Iraq Study group, and authored Strengthening Congress; How Congress Works and Why You Should Care and A Creative Tension: The Foreign Policy Roles of the President and Congress. He is currently director of the Center on Congress at Indiana University.

Monday, Hamilton talked with Indianapolis radio station WIBC about the death of Osama bin Laden and its implications for the ongoing war on terror.

On March 15 the veteran statesman returned to DePauw to address "The U.S. Role in the World After Afghanistan and Iraq" in a Timothy and Sharon Ubben Lecture.  A summary including video clips can be accessed here.

May 4, 2011, Greencastle, Ind. — Angie Hicks, founder and chief marketing officer of Angie's List and 1995 graduate of DePauw University, will address the Venture Club of Indiana tomorrow.  Her 11:15 a.m. speech at the Barnes & Thornburg Conference Center in Indianapolis will cover "Angie's List Market Success Leads to $50M of New Investment," according to the Indianapolis Star.

Learn more at IndyStar.com.

Created by Hicks shortly after she graduated from DePauw, Angie's List collects consumer reviews on local contractors and doctors in more than 500 service categories. Currently, more than 1.5 million consumers in more than 200 cities across the United States and Canada rely on Angie's List to help them make the best hiring decisions. The company collects about 40,000 reviews a month from consumers and is one of the fastest-growing companies in U.S. expanding from a 100-square foot office to a nationwide operation.

In October 2009, Angie Hicks -- who was an economics major and Management Fellow at DePauw and earned an M.B.A. from Harvard Business School -- was honored with DePauw's Robert C. McDermond Medal for Excellence in Entrepreneurship.

Learn more in this recent article.

May 4, 2011, Greencastle, Ind. — By replacing the current anchor of its evening news broadcast, Katie Couric, with 60 Minutes correspondent Scott Pelley, "CBS is positioning itself for the long term, suggests Jeff McCall, media professor at DePauw University," reports the Christian Science Monitor's Gloria Goodale. "The CBS Evening News has a long road back to respectability and ratings success, after being mired in third place for so long behind both NBC and ABC, he says."

Dr. McCall, professor of communication at DePauw and author of the book Viewer Discretion Advised: Taking Control of Mass Media Influences, tells the publication, "Brian Williams at NBC has a solid lead. Diane Sawyer at ABC has not been spectacular, but has held up OK."

The professor says, if CBS is patient with Pelley, its ratings will improve over time. "CBS will have a great opportunity for a ratings jump when Sawyer retires. Sawyer is already well into her sixties. Pelley can get himself established at the anchor desk now while expectations are low. He can then grow his audience over time, particularly when Sawyer steps down and her audience goes browsing," McCall says.

The anchor switch, which is effective June 6, was announced yesterday. Pelley (pictured at right), a 21-year CBS veteran, will also serve as managing editor of the broadcast. 

You'll find the complete article at the Monitor's website.

A 1976 graduate of DePauw, Jeffrey M. McCall is frequently called upon by major media outlets to discuss media matters, McCall has been cited in articles published by more than 100 newspapers. He recently talked with the Los Angeles Times about the decision by Fox News Channel to discontinue Glenn Beck's daily program and has appeared nine times on cable TV's O'Reilly Factor.

May 4, 2011, Greencastle, Ind. — Six senior players on the DePauw University football team were named today to the the National Football Foundation & College Hall of Fame's 2011 NFF Hampshire Honor Society.  The Society is comprised of college football players from all divisions of play who each maintained a 3.2 grade point average or better. A total of 671 players from 241 schools qualified for membership in the society's fifth year.

The Tiger honorees are: Mark Branigan, Tyler Doane, Michael Engle, Adam Hawkins, Derrick Karazsia and Jonathan Lambert.

Only Brown University and Minnesota's Saint John's University (12 each); Iowa's Central College and the University of Dayton (11 each); Amherst College and Wartburg College (10 each); Harvard University, Washington University in St. Louis and South Dakota State University (9 each); Columbia University, Pomona-Pitzer Colleges and Gustavus Adolphus College (8 each); and Yale University, Johns Hopkins University, Nebraska Wesleyan University, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, the University of Rochester (New York), the University of St. Thomas (Minnesota) and Pennsylvania's Lebanon Valley College (7 each) had more players named to the Society.

Brigham Young University, Bentley University (Massachusetts) Bethel University (Minnesota), Bucknell University, Indiana University, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Iowa's Morningside College, Ohio State University, Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology, Saint Xavier University (Illinois), the University of Pennsylvania and Washington and Jefferson College (Pennsylvania) also had six players selected.

Qualifications for membership in the NFF Hampshire Honor Society include:

• Being a starter or a significant substitute in one's last year of eligibility at an accredited NCAA Football Bowl Subdivision, Football Championship Subdivision, Division II, Division III, or an NAIA college or university;
• Achieving a 3.2 cumulative grade point average throughout entire course of undergraduate study; and
• Meeting all NCAA-mandated progress towards degree requirements and graduation.

Access the complete list here.

Led by head coach Robby Long, DePauw finished the 2010 season with a 9-2 record after opening with a school-record nine straight wins to start the season. The Tigers captured their fourth Southern Collegiate Athletic Conference title including their second straight and the program's only outright title. They also earned their second consecutive trip to the NCAA Division III playoffs.

You'll find much more information at the official online home of the DePauw football team.

May 5, 2011, Greencastle, Ind. — "A DePauw senior has turned her experience of a semester studying environmental policy into a documentary she will be screening later this week," begins an article in Greencastle's Banner Graphic. "Sheah Hilton of Plainfield is one of eight students involved in the DePauw Environmental Policy Project this semester. The group spends the semester at the statehouse researching and testifying on environmental legislation."

Jared Jernagan writes, "Hilton studied confined feeding operations (CFOs) and concentrated animal feeding operations (CAFOs). Her documentary is a study of the CFOs and CAFOs in Randolph County in eastern Indiana."

"Randolph County is really being hit with both out-of-state manure and in-state manure from this influx of CAFOs and CFOs," Hilton tells the newspaper. "You have this constant smell of manure that is sickening because it's so close. The ammonia levels are so high that they really can't enjoy being outside like you normally would. We heard a few stories about people actually having to move because they got sick from it."

The senior's documentary, Manure Town, will be screened at 7 o'clock tonight and 2 p.m. Sunday in the auditorium of DePauw University's Richard E. Peeler Art Center.

Access the full story at the newspaper's website.

May 5, 2011, Greencastle, Ind. — Entering next week's NCAA Division III women's golf championship, "DePauw University and Methodist University are the No. 1 and 2-seeded teams, while Williams checked in at No. 5," reports a report in Massachusetts' North Adams Transcript. A field of 19 teams will compete for the national title May 10-13 at the Mission Inn Resort in Howley-in-the-Hills, Florida.

Access the item at the newspaper's website. Also available is the NCAA's announcement.

This marks the Tigers' 10th straight appearance in the NCAA championships. The DePauw women captured their second straight Southern Collegiate Athletic Conference title this year, the program's seventh in the last 10 years.

Read more here.

May 5, 2011, Greencastle, Ind. — Donna Jean Dreyer, a 1953 graduate of DePauw University, has authored Decrescendo: A Memoir of Love and Caregiving. It is her first full-length book.

"In 1979, a few months after our twenty-fifth wedding anniversary, a doctor listened to my husband's heart and identified a decrescendo murmur indicating a leaking aortic valve," notes Dreyer, whose husband, Bill, was a 1952 DePauw graduate. "Because Bill was a musician (as well as being a theater director), this description caught his attention. It was an apt metaphor for the rest of his life. He died just shy of our fiftieth anniversary after slowly fading from the effects of congestive heart failure. This is the story of our relationship and how we sought to maintain the balance and the romance as Bill's strength diminished and I took up the slack."

"Rarely are we invited so deeply into the heart and soul of a marriage as this book offers in its beautiful, moving description of fifty years of growing together 'in sickness and in health,'" says Carolyn Treadway, a personal life coach, who is quoted on the back of the book's jacket. "Decrescendo offers example and inspiration to anyone who seeks enduring relationship and deep engagement with life."

Learn more, and order the book, at Amazon.com.

You're also invited to visit Donna Jean Dreyer's blog.

May 6, 2011, Greencastle, Ind. — DePauw University junior Katelyn "Kate" M. Hendrickson and Garth A. McMains, who plans to attend DePauw beginning in the fall, are both recipients of scholarships from the Indiana Broadcasters Association. IBA awards academic scholarships annually to deserving high school and college students pursuing an education in broadcasting.

A total of 12 students were selected from over 110 applications.

To be eligible for the scholarship, applicants:

• Must have a minimum of a 3.0 grade point average;
• Be a resident of the State of Indiana;
• Must have actively participated in a broadcast facility and/or worked for or interned at a commercial broadcast facility, and received credit in a telecommunications, electronic media or broadcast journalism program, and the educational institution must be a member in the IBA.

Hendrickson is a double major in communication and English (literature) with a minor in Spanish. Active in WGRE, she will serve as assistant news director of DePauw's student radio station next semester. She is also a member of the Tiger softball team.

McMains, a student at South Putnam High School, served as an intern this year at WGRE and plans to enroll as a DePauw freshman in the fall.

The award for high school students is $500, while current college students receive a $2,200 scholarship from IBA.

Learn more at the organization's website.

May 6, 2011, Greencastle, Ind. — Stephanie Nagelkirk, instructor of English at the Indiana Academy for Science, Mathematics, and Humanities at Ball State University, is the 2011 recipient of the Battey National Educator of the Year Award. Administered by DePauw University's Honor Scholar Program, the Battey Award recognizes a teacher who inspired a current DePauw Honor Scholar while that student was attending a high school, middle school or elementary school. Nagelkirk was nominated by Emily Meyers, a senior at DePauw.

The 2011 Battey Award was presented last night at DePauw's Janet Prindle Institute for Ethics.

The Battey National Educator Award provides a $7,500 honorarium for Nagelkirk and a $1,500 grant for the Indiana Academy to be applied, with suggestions from the winner, to programs at the school.

A gift by Charles and Joan (Westmen) Battey created the endowment which funds the award, which was first presented in 2008. Mrs. Battey is a 1954 graduate of DePauw.

Nagelkirk earned an undergraduate degree in criminal justice from Calvin College in Grand Rapids, Michigan, where she worked in the law enforcement field for three years before getting married and moving to the East Coast. While living there, she was invited to teach English at a small private school. After two years of teaching, she returned to school (East Stroudsburg University) and earned an M.Ed. in professional and secondary education in English. She taught for four years in Lansing, Michigan before moving to Indiana and the Indiana Academy for Science, Mathematics, and Humanities, where she has taught for the past six years.

"When I reflect on who I am today, especially my intended career path of being a university professor, I owe a lot of gratitude to Mrs. Nagelkirk," wrote Meyers in her letter recommending her former teacher for the Battey Award. "Mrs. Nagelkirk is presented with the unique challenge of teaching college-level curriculum to 16-year olds who have just moved from home for the first time. Teaching at a two-year immersion program for juniors and seniors where students live on Ball State University’s campus, Stephanie has committed herself to be much more than the typical high school teacher. With unstoppable energy at eight in the morning, she taught me to use writing as a way to value my thoughts; that the power of language -- sculpted by my thoughts, my words -- is immense."

Meyers, who has a goal of teaching at the college level, added, "Her special concern for my well-being outside of the classroom continues to touch me when I think about the kind of teacher I want to be. Like her, I hope to recognize the holistic lives, values, and struggles of my students so I can better prepare them for their own battles. Mrs. Nagelkirk’s gracious understanding and willingness to encourage me to get help, when she saw I was not seeking it myself, continues to give me strength."

Her letter concluded, "Mrs. Nagelkirk is more than an exceptional teacher; she is redefining what it means to be an educator. From her example, I have seen how rewarding the profession can be. I may very well end up attributing my whole career path to her."

In addition to teaching gifted high school juniors and seniors, Nagelkirk is currently in her last year of coursework for her Ph.D. in literature. She also presents workshops on strategies for implementing the project-based learning method of teaching into the secondary and post secondary classroom.

Gregory Lewis, a social studies teacher at Indiana's Columbus East High School, won the inaugural Battey Award.  The 2009 honoree was Andrew Goodwin, a Spanish teacher at Covenant Christian High School in Indianapolis, while last year's award recipient was Bruce R. Myers, a teacher at Willoughby South High School in Ohio.

May 6, 2011, Greencastle, Ind. — "These days, many job seekers go online to connect with employers," notes a Voice of America segment which interviews DePauw University's "career coach." Steve Ember reports, "Job candidates want to show they have a lot to offer. But in many cases they simply apply for a job title and list their work experience. Instead, they should describe the talents and abilities they could bring to an organization. That is the advice of Steve Langerud, director of professional opportunities at DePauw University in Indiana."

VOA notes that Langerud "advises students on career planning and often talks about workplace issues in the media. He says social media sites are valuable when they show the abilities of job candidates and not just their job title and experience."

According to Langerud, "This really is a talent economy, and we're stuck with most job seekers presenting themselves in a job title mode. And I don't think it matches very well."

Ember adds, "Steve Langerud says employers, too, should change their search methods. They should think harder about the skills they really need to help their organization reach its goals."

"Because at the end of the day, it's still about getting the right people in the right place at the right time and then keeping them," says Langerud.

Access audio and text of the piece -- which is airing in East Asia (China), Southeast Asia, South Asia, the Middle East, and most of Africa -- at Voice of America's website.

Steve Langerud is regularly quoted in articles on the job market and career development, including a recent Philadelphia Inquirer piece and MSNBC.com column.

Visit DePauw's Office of Civic, Global and Professional Opportunities here.

May 7, 2011, Greencastle, Ind. — Anjie Britton, a 1992 graduate of DePauw University, has joined TriHealth in Avondale, Ohio as executive director - marketing services.

"Britton brings 19 years of marketing and marketing communications experience to the company," notes an announcement. "From 2001-08 she worked for St. Vincent Health Systems of Indianapolis, serving in positions of increased responsibility. Most recently she served as a consulting in marketing to Ascension Health in Detroit and Carondelet Health Network in Tuscon, Arizona."

After graduating from DePauw, where she majored in communication, Britton received a master's degree from Indiana Wesleyan University.

Read more here.

May 7, 2011, Greencastle, Ind. — "The broadcast news industry continues to caricature itself with super-sized coverage of royal weddings, celebrity washouts and cute animals," writes Jeffrey M. McCall, professor of communication at DePauw University, in today's Indianapolis Star. The op-ed points to criticisms of Federal Communications Commissioner Michael Copps, who has labeled modern television newscasts as "mindless infotainment masquerading as 'news.' "

Dr. McCall writes, "Copps points to a 2010 study by the University of Southern California's Annenberg School that showed an average 30-minute local newscast contains less than 30 seconds of local government news. This is 'the hour of grave peril' for American journalism, Copps says. In absence of news of substance, he says, Americans are left to glean public affairs information from 'attack ads and overly opinionated talking heads.' He told the Conference for Media Reform in Boston, 'Informed electorates depend upon facts, not talking heads hurling opinions at one another.' "

The professor notes research that shows the credibility of most broadcast news networks is suffering. He writes, "It seems odd to hear of the deterioration of news in a world of multiple channels and the Internet. But, as Copps reminds us, as much as 90 percent of news absorbed online actually comes from traditional news sources. And those sources have cut back on budgets, personnel and news of substance, leaving a deficiency in what Copps calls 'accountability journalism.' Thus, the news agenda is filled with simple or sensational stories that are cheap to cover.

Copps is calling for strict requirements that would force outlets to provide more public affairs programming or risk losing their licenses. "Regardless of whether the FCC can enforce public affairs standards, Copps does the nation a tremendous service by using his position to call out the media industry," McCall asserts. "More political and social leaders should demand more broadcaster commitment to public affairs. Citizens, too, should express their concerns to media management. "

The column concludes, "Copps' message today should resonate for years to come, just like former FCC chair Newton Minow's 'vast wasteland' speech in 1961 and CBS journalist Edward R. Murrow's 1956 'wires and lights in a box' speech. Those visionary speeches sounded the alarm but, alas, did little eventual good. The citizenry can ill afford to ignore Copps' heraldry of today."

Access the complete text at IndyStar.com.

Jeff McCall is a 1976 graduate of DePauw, faculty adviser to student radio station WGRE, and author of the book Viewer Discretion Advised: Taking Control of Mass Media Influences. He's frequently called upon by major media outlets to discuss media matters and has been cited in articles published by more than 100 newspapers. He was quoted this week in a Christian Science Monitor report on CBS' decision to make Scott Pelley the anchor and managing editor of the network's Evening News broadcast and recently talked with the Los Angeles Times about the decision by Fox News Channel to discontinue Glenn Beck's daily program.

May 8, 2011, Greencastle, Ind. — A Chicago Daily Herald article on the debate team at Wheeling High School refers to the squad as "a dynasty. They won the state title for the fifth year in a row at the Illinois Congressional Association State Debate Championship in April. Over the past 15 years, Wheeling has taken the state crown 10 times. No other school claimed more than a single title over that time." 

Sheila Ahern reports of the team, "Their heroes are great Wheeling debaters who have gone before them," including "Zach Donisch, a 2008 graduate who is a junior at DePauw University studying Russian and creative writing." Donisch is a senior at DePauw.

Access the story at the newspaper's website.