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NATCHITOCHES –Direct mail expert Hal Malchow, pollster Whit Ayres and communications consultant Michael Sheehan will be the first three speakers in the Winning Communications Lecture Series which begins Thursday at Northwestern State University.
The Lecture Series is being offered through Northwestern State University’s Office of Electronic and Continuing Education and Department of Journalism. NSU students will be able to enroll in Journalism 4100, “Opinion Writing: Persuasive Communications. Non-students can take part though a non-credit course for $99 or $15 per session.
The instructor for the course is Raymond Strother, a leading political consultant and the 2007-08 Erbon W. and Marie Wise Endowed Chair in Journalism, at Northwestern. The class will be held on Thursdays from 5 p.m. until 7:50 p.m. in Room 146 of the Family and Consumer Sciences Building.
Malchow will lead off the series on Jan. 17, followed by Ayres on Jan. 24 and Sheehan on Jan. 31.
Malchow is president of MSHC Partners and a leader in the field of persuasion mail marketing. His creative work has won numerous awards from the International Direct Marketing Association, the Direct Marketing Association of Washington and the American Association of Political Consultants. He is the author of “The New Political Targeting,” published by Campaigns & Elections.
In 2005, Malchow received the Sisk Award for pioneering vision that has shaped the direct marketing industry. The last two recipients were the marketing director at NIKE and the National Geographic Society.
Before entering the direct mail business in 1985, he managed four major campaigns including the first Senate campaign of Al Gore.
Ayres graduated cum laude from Davidson College with a major in political science. He received an M.A. and Ph.D. in political science from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. His firm provided polling for Georgia Senator Paul Coverdell's upset of Wyche Fowler in 1992 and Tennessee Senator Bill Frist's upset of Jim Sasser in 1994. Other political clients include U.S. Sen. Lamar Alexander of Tennessee and Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, former Governors David Beasley and Carroll Campbell of South Carolina and Alexander’s 1996 presidential campaign.
His comments and analysis appear periodically in The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Los Angeles Times, USA Today and numerous regional newspapers. He also appears periodically on Fox News, CNN and National Public Radio.
Ayres served as Senior Executive Assistant for Budget and Policy to Governor Carroll Campbell in South Carolina. He has also served as a tenured member of the political science faculty at the University of South Carolina.
Sheehan has been a leader in the field of communications consulting for more than 25 years. He has prepared countless corporate spokespersons for programs including Nightline, 60 Minutes, 20/20, The Today Show, Good Morning America and Crossfire and prepares senior corporate executives to step into the media/public affairs spotlight.
Sheehan coached President Bill Clinton during the 1992 and 1996 campaigns, presidential debates, and for all of his Inaugural, State of the Union, and Oval Office addresses. He coached both John Kerry and John Edwards for the 2004 Presidential/Vice Presidential Debates.
In 1988, Sheehan was debate coach for former Sen. Lloyd Bentsen in his celebrated debate with Vice President Dan Quayle, and for Vice President Al Gore in his CNN debate with H. Ross Perot as well as the 1996 Vice Presidential Debate with Jack Kemp. Since 1988, he has been hired by the Democratic National Committee for every convention to edit the texts and rehearse all speakers, including the party's nominees and keynote speakers, for their nationally televised convention speeches.
He received his bachelor’s degree from Georgetown University and his MFA from the Yale School of Drama. He is a guest lecturer at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government. In 1991, he received the Individual Achievement Award from the American Speech, Language and Hearing Association and was recently named to the Leadership Council for the Yale School of Drama.
Photo by Michael Silver
KALB News Channel 5 Anchor Farrah Reyna, of Alexandria speaks to a crowd of more than 150 during the 40th annual Journalism Day "J-Day" held by the Northwestern State University Journalism Department on Friday, Nov . 30. Reyna, a 2000 Northwestern graduate, discussed the daily process of covering a story and other tips about entering the field of journalism , including broadcast , print media and public relations.
Photo by Michael Silver
NATCHITOCHES,
- Four Northwestern State University graduates were selected as the
2007 inductees into the Alumni Hall of Distinction, the Long Purple
Line on Oct. 27, 2007. One of those is John A. Manno, Jr., of Bossier
City. Manno has established the Michael Peter Manno Scholarship in
Northwestern’s Department of Journalism.
Manno is vice
president and co-owner of Southland Printing Co. in Shreveport. He is a
board member for the Volunteers of America and the American Red Cross
Northwest Louisiana Chapter. Manno has also been a member of the board
and past president of the Sales and Marketing Executives of
Shreveport/Bossier, a member of the Krewe of Gemini and on the board of
directors of the Strand Theatre and the University Club. He has also
been active in Holy Trinity and St. Pius X Catholic Church.
Manno
was a member of Kappa Sigma Fraternity where he was the 2006 Alumnus of
the Year. He has served on the NSU Foundation Board of Directors and is
a member of the NSU Alumni Association and the NSU Athletic
Association.
Alexandyr Kent, movie
industry reporter, performing arts critic and features writer for The
Shreveport Times, will speak at Northwestern State University on
Monday, November 5 at 1 p.m. in the Ora Williams Media Center in 142
Kyser Hall.
The topic of his speech will be "The Great Reader Chase: Newspaper
reporting in a digital age." Kent’s talk is part of the NSU
Department of Journalism’s Newsmakers and Shakers Open Forum.
Kent often works as one of the newspaper’s mobile journalists, who file
stories and photographs “live” from the field for shreveporttimes.com.
His compact car often serves as his office, and his backpack is stuffed
with a laptop, cell card, camera, professional audio recorder,
microphone and more computer cables than necessary. He produces stories
for a variety of mediums, including print, audio, videos and photo
slideshows. His blog, Louisiana Movies, is among the newspaper’s most
popular.
In 2004, he and 24 arts critics and reporters were chosen to
participate in the first meeting of the NEA Arts Journalism Institute
in Classical Music and Opera, which was held in New York.
Before joining The Shreveport Times, Kent worked as a magazine editor
in Ruston, La. Prior to moving to Louisiana in 2002, he worked for the
Walker Art Center, a multidisciplinary museum in Minneapolis, Minn. In
his arts and movie reporting, he frequently draws from experiences
gained through the Walker’s education and film/video departments. He
also interned at two of Minneapolis’s literary nonprofits: the
publisher Milkweed Editions and the literary writers’ center The Loft.
Kent holds a master’s degree in English literature from the University
of Oregon (2001), where he also studied film history and worked as a
graduate teaching fellow. He also has a bachelor’s degree in English
literature from the University of Minnesota, Morris (1997), where he
wrote and directed a student film that will never again see the light
of day.
The event is open to the public.
Gary Fields,
a 1982 journalism major from Northwestern State University, will
receive the second annual North Star News Prize on Nov. 19, 2007, in
New York City. A staff reporter for the Wall Street Journal, Fields is
being recognized for his reporting the challenges facing incarcerated
men and women and inequities in applying the death penalty.
The North Star News Prize recognizes people of color who have made
outstanding contributions to journalism, media and
communications. The
name comes from the anti-slavery newspaper, the North Star, founded by
Frederick Douglass in 1847. The News Prize acknowledges
outstanding
journalism and media professionals who have taken Douglass’ words to
heart: “In order for justice to be done, we must not be
silent.”
Fields also serves on the advisory board for the Department of
Journalism at NSU.
Dr. Hesham Mesbah, a visiting professor from Kuwait University, accompanied Dr. Paula Furr and Mrs. Mary Brocato to Peabody Magnet High School in Alexandria, La., on Sept. 4. As a part of the department's scholastic outreach program, department faculty talked to students in the communications arts programs about careers in mass communications and pursuing a college degree. Dr. Mesbah talked with students about Arab media systems.
