“I am proud and excited to welcome these new members into our Medill community,” said Medill Dean Charles Whitaker. “Our faculty are the foundation of what makes Medill the leading school of its kind in the world from journalism to integrated marketing communications. I look forward to the valuable contributions that these colleagues will make in the classroom and in their respective areas of expertise.”
New faculty members include:
Danielle Robinson Bell (BSJ99) joins Medill as an assistant professor in IMC. Bell’s area of expertise is strategic communications. Her career has included senior management roles at several of the world’s most respected advertising agencies. In those roles, she worked alongside billion-dollar brands like Tide, Gillette, Visa, and Verizon Wireless to create integrated marketing campaigns for various consumer segments across general market, multicultural and millennial audiences. In 2015, Bell launched Pen and Voice, Inc., a writing and messaging practice for businesses, brands, and executives. In addition to earning a BSJ from Medill, she also holds an MBA from Northwestern’s Kellogg.
Kalyani Chadha joins Medill from the University of Maryland as an associate professor in journalism. Kalyani’s research focuses on issues of media globalization and the implications of new media technologies with a particular emphasis on the journalism landscape in India. Her work has appeared in leading journals such as Media, Culture and Society, the Journal of Broadcast and Electronic Media, and Global Media and Communication and Convergence. She has also presented at major media and journalism-related conferences, including AEJMC, IAMCR, ICA and NCA.
Jeremy Gilbert (BSJ00, MSJ00) returns to Medill as the new Knight Chair for Digital Media Strategy. Gilbert previously served as a member of the Medill faculty from 2008 to 2013. Since 2014, he has served as director of strategic initiatives at The Washington Post where he directed a lab dedicated to experimental storytelling aimed at creating unique digital products and stories. These have included The Post’s first artificial intelligence storytelling system and first augmented and virtual reality projects.
Ivan J. Meyers joins the Medill faculty as a lecturer. He has overseen television studio operations at Medill in Washington, D.C. since 2002. In addition to video journalism classes at Medill, he has also taught video courses geared for journalists at other institutions, including the National Press Club, the American Red Cross and Georgetown University. Meyers is the founder of Out of the Cave Production and Technology Company, comprising a wide range of multimedia and technological offerings. Early in his career, Meyers worked as a production specialist in the eBusiness and digitization department at NBC News in New York where he ushered in a new era of video editing on desktop computers, and laid the ground work to transition the network’s video workflow to a tapeless environment.
Sherrell Dorsey also joins Medill this year as the inaugural Medill-Garage Fellow. Dorsey is founder and editor-in-chief of The Plug, a subscription-based digital news and insights platform covering the Black innovation economy as well as investigating and reporting on Black tech trends, stories and breaking news. The one-year fellowship supports entrepreneurs from underrepresented groups—with an emphasis on women and people of color—who are working on innovation in the media industry.
Photo from left to right top to bottom: Bell, Chadha, Gilbert, Meyers and Dorsey.
