Tunnel Vision Issue 24 • Spring 2016

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ISSUE 24 H SPRING 2016

ALUMNI EXPERTISE … Several Vanderbilt Student Media alumni share their expertise with student journalists … see page 6 and 8.

tunnelvision

Vanderbilt Student Media Hall of Fame 2016 Induction Ceremony scheduled for Oct. 21

The 2016 class of Hall of Famers will be inducted 3-4:30 p.m. on Friday, Oct. 21, at the Student Media Reunion and 2016 Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony at the John Seigenthaler Center, located near the corner of 18th and Edgehill avenues on the Peabody campus. Reception to follow ceremony. Limited seating is available, so please let us know if you plan to attend by visiting vandymedia.org. We hope to see you on Oct. 21.

NOMINATE ALUMNI FOR HALL OF FAME If you or someone you know would be a great addition to the Vanderbilt Student Media Hall of Fame, please email nominations to selection committee chair Paige Clancy at paige.clancy@vanderbilt.edu. Nominations ideally should include a brief description of the nominee’s participation in student media, class year and details of personal and/or professional accomplishments.

HALL OF FAME CRITERIA To be considered for induction in the Hall of Fame, candidates must meet the following criteria. Candidates are not required to be currently working in journalism or the media. • Last worked with Vanderbilt Student Media as a student staff member at least 10 years prior to their potential Hall of Fame induction date; • Contributed in a significant way as a staff member to one or more of Vanderbilt’s print or electronic student media organizations; • Distinguished themselves through their work and acts at a level that merits recognition of the highest honor bestowed by Vanderbilt Student Media.

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VANESSA B. BEASLEY

ALUMNI

NEW ALUMNI DIRECTOR

ALUMNI UPDATES

Emily Maggart, BA’03, M.Ed’11, named Director of Development … page 2

A publication for alumni of student media at Vanderbilt University

PLEASE JOIN US!

DEVELOPMENT

ANDREW MARANISS

Several of your former staff members and classmates give a glimpse into their lives since Vanderbilt … page 3 Cierra Lockett, 2014 see page 5…

PAT NOLAN

WENDELL (SONNY) RAWLS JR.

THE CLASS OF 2016 Four alumni to join Vanderbilt Student Media Hall of Fame in 2016

by Ann Marie Deer Owens (BA'76) The newest members of the Vanderbilt Student Media Hall of Fame include a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, a public relations executive and political analyst, a Vanderbilt dean, and the author of a New York Times bestseller on sports and civil rights pioneer Perry Wallace. Selected for the 2016 class are Vanessa B. Beasley, Andrew Maraniss, Pat Nolan and Wendell (Sonny) Rawls Jr. A ceremony and reception to honor the inductees will be held during Vanderbilt Reunion Oct. 21 at the John Seigenthaler Center. This marks the seventh class of the Vanderbilt Student Media Hall of Fame. To be selected, Vanderbilt alumni must have demonstrated leadership in student media and then distinguished themselves in their careers.

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VANESSA B. BEASLEY Beasley, dean of The Martha Rivers Ingram Commons and an associate professor of communication studies, grew up in Jacksonville, Florida, and came to Vanderbilt as a first-year student in 1984. She had been the editor of her student newspaper in high school, but wanted to explore different media in college. "I joined the news team at WRVU and added my name to the wait list to be a disc jockey," Beasley said. She met her future spouse, Trey

Beasley, at WRVU. "I was into REM, the Ramones and other bands coming out of the college scene," she said. "The radio station provided some extra space for me to be creative. I encourage our students 'to try different voices' while they have the opportunity." Beasley served as secretary for the student media board her junior year. "I learned valuable lessons about managing volunteers for a nonprofit organization and conducting board meetings," she said. Beasley earned her bachelor of arts in speech communication and theatre arts in 1988 and went on to the University of Texas, where she received a doctorate in speech communication. She taught at Texas A&M University, Southern Methodist University and the University of Georgia before coming "home" to Vanderbilt's Department of Communication Studies in 2007. Media was an important part of her life in college and that has continued in her research, with a focus on race, gender and diversity in U.S. political rhetoric. She is the author of Who Belongs in America? Presidents, Rhetoric and Immigration and You, the People: American National Identity in Presidential Rhetoric: 1885-2000. One of the courses she teaches, "Mass Media and Politics," looks at the business of media, which she said is especially appropriate this election cycle. In 2015, she led a new Maymester course that she created in partnership with Queen's University, Belfast, to explore the comparative, transnational

understanding of the civil rights movements in the southern United States and in Belfast in the 1950s and 60s. Also in 2015, Beasley was named dean of the Ingram Commons, where she serves as the academic leader, mentor and senior administrator of the first-year experience at Vanderbilt. "I didn't feel like I fit in when I arrived here as a student, so I think it's really important that our exceptionally talented faculty and staff across campus strive to meet students 'where they are' when they in the transition from high school to college," Beasley said. "That's why I am so committed to helping every incoming student find his or her place on our campus." Beasley is joined in the Dean's Residence on campus by her husband, Trey, who is assistant vice chancellor for treasury and university treasurer, and their two sons.

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ANDREW MARANISS One of the requirements for all firstyear Vanderbilt students is the Commons Reading—a text that all students receive by mail and are expected to read over the summer prior to their first semester. The undergraduate Class of 2020 will read Strong Inside: Perry Wallace and the Collision of Race and Sports in the South (Vanderbilt University Press, December HALL OF FAME, continued on page 6

Olney pays it forward in sports journalism education by Ben Weinrib

Olney offers his time and expertise to students during VSC's Sports Reporting Workshop in 2016. photo by Ziyi Liu

Visiting Nashville is a homecoming of sorts for Buster Olney. Although he grew up in Vermont, which he still sees as his true home, and currently lives outside of New York City, Nashville has a special place in the ESPN reporter’s heart. It’s the city in which he went to college, the city in which he started

his journalistic career and much more. Olney makes sure to visit every year, whether it be the Major League Baseball Winter Meetings, which have come two of the past four years, or just a trip to meet up with old friends. “I’m a Vermonter,” Olney says. “But I always tell people that if I get OLNEY, continued on page 5


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