Directory | Philip Merrill College of Journalism

Faculty
The faculty, adjunct faculty, administration and staff of the Philip Merrill College of Journalism are leaders in the fields of print, broadcast and online journalism and internationally renowned communication scholars.

Maurine H. Beasley
Professor, Ph.D., George Washington
Maurine H. Beasley, former education editor of the Kansas City (Mo.) Star and former staff writer for The Washington Post, is a journalism historian who specializes in women's portrayal and participation in journalism. Her particular focus is Washington women journalists, including their coverage of First Ladies. She was named a Distinguished Senior Scholar by the Educational Foundation of the American Association of University Women and received a Leadership Award in 2001 from the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication of which she is a past national president. She also is a former president of the American Journalism Historians Association. She has taught journalism at Jinan University in China under a Fulbright grant.

Alice Bonner
Lecturer, Ph.D., North Carolina
Alice Bonner is the former director of journalism education for The Freedom Forum. She has been a The Washington Post reporter and editor, a USA Today cover stories editor, and a recruiter of journalists for Gannett newspapers. She has worked in efforts to improve scholastic journalism and newsroom diversity for a number of journalism organizations. Her research interests include journalism history, press integration and news coverage of societal disparities.

David Broder
Professor, M.A., Chicago
David Broder is a Pulitzer Prize-winning, nationally acclaimed political reporter and a columnist for The Washington Post. He has covered every presidential election since 1960. He joined the Post in 1966 after covering national politics for The New York Times, Washington Star and Congressional Quarterly. He continues to cover government and politics for his twice-weekly syndicated column, which appears worldwide in more than 300 newspapers.

Ira Chinoy
Associate Professor, A.B., Harvard College
Ira Chinoy has 24 years of experience as a journalist at four newspapers: The Washington Post, The Providence (R.I.) Journal, The Lawrence (Mass.) Eagle-Tribune and The Pine Bluff (Ark.) Commercial. As director of computer-assisted reporting at The Washington Post, he was part of a team that won the Pulitzer Prize for Public Service for a 1998 series on the use of deadly force by the D.C. police. At The Providence Journal, where he was a reporter from 1981 to 1995, Chinoy was part of a team that won the Pulitzer Prize in Investigative Reporting for coverage of corruption and patronage in the Rhode Island courts. Chinoy has been on the faculty of the College of Journalism since 2001, first as a visiting professor and now as associate professor.

Cassandra Clayton
CNS Broadcast Bureau Director, B.A., Spelman College
Cassandra Clayton is director of the Capital News Service broadcast bureau, overseeing production of the student-run nightly newscast, Maryland Newsline. Hired as an NBC News correspondent in 1983, over the next two decades she reported from their Atlanta, Chicago, New York and Washington, D.C., bureaus. She co-anchored a nightly news and talk program on CNBC called "The Real Story," and substitute anchored Nightly News Weekend Edition, Sunrise and the Today news segment. Prior or coming to the University of Maryland, she most recently reported and anchored for MSNBC and taught broadcast journalism at Howard University.

Reese Cleghorn
Professor, M.A., Columbia
Reese Cleghorn is the former dean of the College. Before becoming professor and dean in 1981, he worked on newspapers for more than 30 years. Cleghorn served as president of the National Conference of Editorial Writers in 1980. He co-authored "Climbing Jacob's Ladder," a book about the civil rights movement and the South. He contributed to eight anthologies on racial, urban and other social problems, has written more than 250 magazine articles, and has contributed commentary and analysis to numerous major newspapers and professional journals. A journalism graduate of Emory University, he holds a master's degree in public law and government from Columbia University. He stepped down as dean in June 2000.

Steve Crane
Assistant Dean, B.S., Maryland
An alumnus of the College, Steve Crane now serves as the College's assistant dean. Previously he was Washington bureau director for the College's Capital News Service. Crane is a former deputy metro editor and statehouse reporter for The Washington Times. He also worked as a reporter for The Parkersburg (W.Va.) Sentinel and The South Prince George's (Md.) Independent.

Adrianne Flynn
CNS Washington Bureau Director, Lecturer, B.A., Arizona State
Adrianne Flynn is the Washington, D.C., bureau director for the College's Capital News Service. Formerly a Washington correspondent for the Arizona Republic, where she covered U.S. Sen. John McCain, she also worked as a reporter for The Washington Times, where she covered Mayor Marion Barry's return, and for The Dayton (Ohio) Daily News, where she covered serial murderer Jeffrey Dahmer and the 11-day Lucasville, Ohio prison riot. She started her career at the Mesa (AZ) Tribune.

Jon Franklin
Professor and Philip Merrill Chair, B.S., Maryland
Jon Franklin is a literary journalist whose work frequently focuses on the human side of science and technology. In a career that has spanned more than four decades he has written five books and a variety of magazine articles and newspaper stories and series. Known for his innovations both in style and reportage, his credits include two first-in-category Pulitzer prizes (feature writing in 1979 and expository journalism in 1985). He has taught at the University of Maryland, Oregon State University, and the University of Oregon, where his duties included the directorship of the creative writing program.

Penny Bender Fuchs
Director of Career Development and Internships, M.A., Maryland
Penny Bender Fuchs heads the administration of student internships, career placement and scholarships. Fuchs, who has many industry contacts from her long journalism career, also teaches newswriting and handles the college's assessment program. Prior to joining the college, she spent 10 years covering Capitol Hill, primarily for Gannett News Service, the national wire for Gannett's 100 daily newspapers.

Douglas Gomery
Professor Emeritus; Resident Scholar, Library of American Broadcasting, Ph.D., Wisconsin
Douglas Gomery has written for the Village Voice, Modern Maturity, The Wilson Quarterly, The Baltimore Sun and other newspapers. He is a former senior researcher for the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars Media Studies project, and is the author of 10 books on both the history and economics of the mass media in America. His books -- and more than 600 articles -- have been translated into eight languages. Gomery has been interviewed during the past few years on NPR and for The Washington Post, Christian Science Monitor, The New York Times, The (Baltimore) Sun, and other media outlets.

Michael Gurevitch
Professor, Ph.D., MIT
Michael Gurevitch served as a faculty member at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and the Open University in England. He joined the College of Journalism in 1983. He is the author and editor of nine books as well as numerous journal articles and book chapters. His book, "The Crisis of Public Communication" (London, Routledge), based on his work with his long-time colleague Jay Blumler, was published in 1996. Gurevitch also participated in two cross-national comparative studies of the globalization of television news, the first published under the title "Global Newsrooms, Local Audiences" and the second titled "News of the World" which examines audience reception of television news in different countries. In 1995 he was awarded a Fulbright Research Grant, and and spent the spring 1996 semester at the Department of Journalism, Media and Communication at Stockholm University in Sweden. In 2005 he was awarded, jointly with Jay Blumler, the Murray Edelman Distinguished Career Award by the Political Communication Section of the American Political Science Association.

Christopher Hanson
Associate Professor, Ph.D., North Carolina; M.A., Oxford; B.A., Reed
Christopher Hanson worked for 20 years as a reporter for Time, The Washington Star, Reuters and the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, focusing on topics such as presidential politics, Congress, the environment, American diplomacy and military affairs. Hanson was a combat correspondent in the Gulf War and covered the civil war in Rwanda. He joined the Philip Merrill College of Journalism in 1999 after earning a Ph.D. in Mass Communication from the University of North Carolina under a Freedom Forum Fellowship and an M.A. in political theory and moral philosophy in 1984 from Oxford University.

Chris Harvey
Online Bureau Director, Lecturer, B.S., Maryland
Chris Harvey has worked as an online editor, a magazine editor, a newspaper reporter and a journalism teacher. She left her job as managing editor at American Journalism Review in August 2000 to help build the online curriculum at the College. She created and now edits the College's online newsmagazine, Maryland Newsline, which is staffed by students.Before coming to AJR, Harvey worked as an associate Metro editor at washingtonpost.com. There, she led a content redesign of the Metro section and edited news and feature stories.

Don Heider
Associate Dean, Associate Professor, Ph.D. University of Colorado, M.A. American University, B.A. Colorado State University
Don Heider is an author, researcher and award-winning broadcast news journalist. Heider spent ten years working in TV news as a photographer, reporter, producer and manager. During his career Heider received five Emmy awards, a regional Edward R. Murrow, and a Tennessee Associated Press Award. He taught previously at American University, Ole Miss, and the University of Colorado.

Ray Hiebert
Professor Emeritus, BA Stanford, MS Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism, MA, PhD University of Maryland
Ray E. Hiebert is a specialist in international communication, government-media relations, mass media in society and public relations, and he has professional experience in newspapers, radio, television and public relations. From 1991 to 1995, he was director of the American Journalism Center in Budapest, and has been specializing in media developments in Hungary and Eastern Europe. He is the author of a number of books on journalism and mass media, and is the editor of Public Relations Review, a quarterly journal. Hiebert was the founding dean of the College, where he continues to teach part-time. He holds degrees from the University of Maryland, Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism and Stanford University. He was given the University of Maryland's Landmark Award for International Service in 2000.

Diana Huffman
Baltimore Sun Distinguished Lecturer, J.D., Georgetown; M.S., Columbia
Diana Huffman has served as managing editor of National Journal and as editor of Legal Times in Washington, D.C. She also worked as a radio and TV reporter in New York City and Louisville, Ky. Huffman served as a senior aide in the U.S. Senate for 10 years. She is a member of the Board of Directors of Justice at Stake in Washington, D.C., and participated in the 2000 Presidential Appointee Initiative, a joint project of the Brookings Institution and the Council for Excellence in Government.

Haynes Johnson
Professor and Knight Chair, M.A. Wisconsin
Haynes Johnson is a best-selling author, national TV commentator, former Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist with The Washington Post and The Washington Star. He is considered one of the nation's leading political journalists. In addition to teaching and advising students, he is a contributing editor for American Journalism Review, the national magazine published by the College.

Sue Kopen Katcef
Lecturer, B.S. Maryland
Sue Kopen Katcef is an award winning veteran broadcast journalist who teaches news writing and production for broadcast journalism students. In addition, Sue serves as the Executive Producer for the awarding winning daily news show, “Maryland Newsline,” and Terp Weekly Edition. She is the faculty adviser to the campus chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists, and serves on the national board.Prior to coming to the College of Journalism, Katcef was a reporter and anchor for WBAL Radio news in Baltimore. She has also worked as a reporter in television with stops at Baltimore’s WJZ and Maryland Public Television.

Thomas Kunkel
Dean, Professor and President of AJR, M.A., Evansville
Thomas Kunkel is dean of the College and president of American Journalism Review, a national magazine published by the College. At Maryland he has served as director of the Knight Center for Specialized Journalism, and as editor and director of the Project on the State of the American Newspaper. A writer and editor, Kunkel has spent most of his career in newspaper management. Most recently he was deputy managing editor of the San Jose Mercury News. Prior to that he worked for the Miami Herald, The New York Times and the Cincinnati Post, and he was editor and publisher of Arizona Trend magazine. When he was named executive editor of Knight-Ridder's Columbus (Ga.) Ledger-Enquirer, he was, at age 29, the youngest top editor in company history. He has written or edited five books, including "Genius in Disguise: Harold Ross of The New Yorker."

Rafael Lorente
Annapolis Bureau Director, Capital News Service,

Susan Moeller
Associate Professor; Director, ICMPA, Ph.D. & A.M. Harvard; B.A. Yale
Dr. Susan Moeller is the director of the International Center for Media and the Public Agenda at the University of Maryland, College Park. She is also an associate professor in the Philip Merrill College of Journalism at the University of Maryland and an affiliated faculty member at the School of Public Policy. An accomplished author, she is an expert in terrorism, war and conflict as it relates to the media. Moeller was formerly the director of the Journalism Program at Brandeis University, a Fulbright Professor in Pakistan and Thailand and has taught in the history department of Princeton.

Deborah Nelson
Director, Carnegie Seminar, J.D., DePaul; B.S., Northern Illinois
Deb Nelson, a Pulitzer Prize winning investigations reporter and editor, directs the Merrill College's Carnegie Seminar. Nelson worked at small, medium and large metropolitan dailies, covered a variety of beats and produced more than two-dozen investigative projects over the past 30 years. She is on the board of the Fund for Investigative Journalism, on the executive committee of the Dart Center for Journalism and Trauma and former president of Investigative Reporters and Editors.

John Newhagen
Associate Professor, Ph.D., Stanford
John Newhagen worked as a foreign correspondent in Central America and the Caribbean for nearly 10 years. He served as bureau chief in San Salvador, regional correspondent in Mexico City, and foreign editor in Washington, D.C. for United Press International during the 1980s. Newhagen's research on the effects of emotion in television and on the Internet have been published widely in a number of leading academic journals.

Leonard Pitts Jr.
Visiting Professor,
Pulitzer Prize winning columnist Leonard Pitts has joined the Merrill College as a visiting professor and teaches courses in cultural criticism. Pitts lives in Bowie, Md., where he writes his syndicated column for the Miami Herald on pop culture, social issues and family life. Pitts was awarded the 2004 Pulitzer Prize for commentary. He was also a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in 1992. The Society of Professional Journalists, the National Association of Black Journalists and the Simon Wiesenthal Center, among others, have honored him. He is a five-time recipient of the National Headliners Award. In 2001, he received the American Society of Newspaper Editors prestigious ASNE Award For Commentary Writing and was named Feature of the Year Columnist by Editor and Publisher magazine. In 2002, the National Society of Newspaper Columnists awarded Pitts its inaugural Columnist of the Year award. Also in 2002, GLAAD Media awarded Pitts the Outstanding Newspaper Columnist award. He has taught previously at Hampton University, Ohio University and Virginia Commonwealth University.

Gene Roberts
Professor, B.A., North Carolina
Gene Roberts came to the College in 1991, following 18 years as the executive editor of The Philadelphia Inquirer, which won 17 Pulitzer Prizes during his editorship. He took a hiatus from his university work from 1994 to 1997 to serve as managing editor of The New York Times. In 1998, he returned to the College, where he teaches courses on writing the complex story, the press and the civil rights movement, and newsroom management. He received the National Press Club's Fourth Estate Award for Distinguished Contributions to Journalism in 1993.

Carol Rogers
Director, Doctoral and Research Studies, Ph.D., Maryland
Carol Rogers is the former head of the Office of Communications for the American Association for the Advancement of Science. She serves as editor for the journal Science Communication. Rogers arranges symposia and speaks at conferences in the U.S. and abroad. She is a board member of the Council for the Advancement of Science Writing, and secretary of the section on general interest in science engineering of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, of which she is a fellow.

George Solomon
Shirley Povich Professor, B.S. University of Florida
George Solomon, former AME/Sports at the Washington Post and ESPN Ombudsman, is the Merrill College's Shirley Povich Professor. Named after the legendary Washington Post sports columnist Shirley Povich, this endowed professorship is held by a leader in sports journalism. Solomon was assistant managing editor for sports at the Post from 1975 to 2003. He was responsible for major growth in the section and for hiring and developing some of its most distinctive writers, including Thomas Boswell, Tony Kornheiser, Michael Wilbon, Sally Jenkins and Andrew Beyer. Though formally retired, Solomon continues to write a Sunday column in the sports section of the paper. He has written a book on Povich's columns with Povich's children entitled, All Those Mornings At the Post.

Linda Steiner
Professor, Ph.D., University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign
Linda Steiner studies how and when gender matters in news and newsrooms and how feminist groups use media. Other research areas include media ethics; journalism history; and public journalism. Steiner is editor of Critical Studies in Media Communication and serves on six editorial boards. Before coming to Maryland she taught at Rutgers University, where she served as Department Chair and coordinator of the Ph.D. program's Media Studies track. She has written, co-authored, or edited several books, book chapters, and refereed articles. Steiner has chaired several task forces for the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication, for which she is now drafting a code of ethics.

Carl Sessions Stepp
Professor, M.A., South Carolina
Carl Sessions Stepp serves as a senior editor of American Journalism Review, where he reviews books each issue and writes about changes in the news profession. Among his articles in AJR were: "The X Factor" (on attracting young readers); "The Thrill Is Gone" (a cover story on staff demoralization in many newsrooms); "Reinventing the Newsroom" (on changing newsroom structures); and "How to Save America's Newspapers." Stepp has served as a writing and editing coach for newspapers across the country, including The Bergen (N.J.) Record, The Oregonian, The Tampa Tribune, USA TODAY and The Washington Post, as well as Toronto Globe and Mail.

Kevin Swift
Lecturer, B.A., Westminster College; M.A. Duquesne University
Kevin Swift teaches broadcast production and serves as the production advisor for the Capital News Service program. He is a veteran of broadcast news in many capacities. Kevin worked as a writer/producer and reporter for several TV and radio stations in Youngstown, Ohio and Pittsburgh, Pa. Most recently he served as an anchor/reporter for the award winning news team at WVLK News in Lexington, Ky.

Lee Thornton
Professor and Richard Eaton Chair , Ph.D., Northwestern
Lee Thornton holds the College's Richard Eaton chair in Broadcast Journalism. She is a former CBS News White House correspondent and CNN program producer. As a National Public Radio show host she won the prestigious gold "Cindy." She has worked in local radio and television and is a longtime, award-winning media production consultant to government and industry. Since 1998, her students have more than 50 regional and national citations from the Society of Professional Journalists and the Hearst Foundation. She created two award-winning shows for UMTV and Research Channel and has been honored with outstanding teaching awards mulitple times. Thornton has lectured widely on minorities in the media, women in the media, and journalism education issues.

Michael Williams
Associate Professor, M.S., Univ. of Kansas; BS, Univ. of Kansas
Michael I. Williams is an associate professor with emphasis on new media and visual communication. He was previously the director of graduate studies at the School of Visual Communication at Ohio University and has also held an associate professor position at the University of North Carolina. He has spent many years as a professional journalist and new media pioneer before entering academia. In addition to his teaching responsibilities, Williams has done extensive visual communication consulting throughout the U.S. and Russia.

Eric Zanot
Associate Professor, Ph.D., Illinois
Eric Zanot's professional experience includes work in public information for public television and stints in two of the nation's largest advertising agencies. Zanot's research interests focus on the regulation of false and deceptive advertising. He has co-edited a book, authored chapters and monographs, written numerous articles and delivered many academic papers on advertising topics. The courses he teaches include Advertising in America, Persuasion in Advertising, Advertising and Society, and a graduate seminar in Advertising.