Teaching

61-412 LAW OF MASS COMMUNICATION (Cowling)
Students produced in-depth project papers based on research of recent and current coverage of the 2008 presidential election, a review of Supreme Court rulings involving campaign finance, and personal interviews with minority students and residents. The focus of the project paper was on the legal landscape today of affirmative action and diversity, and how the news media dealt with the complexities associated with covering a historic election in which an African-American was nominated for president and a woman was nominated for vice president.

Other Activities

Support for Black Thursday events
The Department of Journalism and the student chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists provided financial assistance for the Black Thursday events on Nov. 20, 2008. A panel discussion and related activities commemorated the 40th anniversary of the day that nearly 100 African-American students on campus were arrested, and later expelled, for a protest that sought more support from the administration. A journalism graduate who covered that event in 1968 for The Paper, Eileen Hammer Housfeld, was one of the panelists. She also spoke separately to a group of journalism students and professors about the campus climate in the late 1960s.