JSU President Carolyn Meyers said the school would equip students with the skills "to tell the stories that matter, to connect to audiences in meaningful ways and to take their places as producers, owners and leaders in the ever-evolving media communications industry." Photo by R. L. Nave.
Jackson State University will have a journalism school, officials announced yesterday evening.
After the JSU mass-communications department temporarily lost its accreditation, the university sought to establish a new school. In March 2015, Dr. Elayne Hayes-Anthony joined JSU from Belhaven University as part of the mass communication department and made a number of new hires.
The new School of Journalism and Media Studies will be housed at the JSU e-Center, which hosted the announcement and reception on Nov. 12. Anthony believes the new school elevates JSU to the national media stage.
"It is our hope that students will be energized, that faculty will be motivated, and the media community will wholeheartedly assist us on our journey toward communication excellence in all disciplines," Anthony said.
School officials said JSU would become the seventh historically black college or university to have its own J-school and the third school to have such a school in Mississippi.
Some 250 undergrads and 44 grad students are enrolled in the school, which will also house various campus media vehicles including JSU TV, WJSU Radio, Tiger TV, student-run newspaper the Blue & White Flash, Experience Magazine and WeatherVision.
JSU President Carolyn Meyers said the school would equip students with the skills "to tell the stories that matter, to connect to audiences in meaningful ways and to take their places as producers, owners and leaders in the ever-evolving media communications industry."
(JFP News Editor R.L. Nave participated on an advisory committee that helped develop the JSU journalism school.)
More stories by this author
Support our reporting -- Follow the MFP.
