Author: James

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Graduation Day at CUNY SPS

The perfect way to end an academic year is to celebrate the accomplishments of our amazing students. It has been a genuine honor to serve as the Interim Academic Director of the Communication and Media Program at the CUNY School of Professional Studies (SPS) this year.

This was a role I previously served in from 2013 – 2016, and due to my previous experience with the institution, the administration at SPS asked for me to serve in an interim capacity while the current Director was on research leave. I am happy to say that I will be staying on through at least the Fall while the current Director puts the finishing touches on a completed manuscript deal.

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It is good to be back at CUNY-SPS!

I had the pleasure of sitting down with Dean Jorge Silva-Puras for an interview on my role as the Interim Academic Director of the Communication and Media program at the CUNY School of Professional Studies (SPS). During the session, we discussed what it is like to head up one of the only fully online four-year degrees within CUNY. The talk ventured into how the asynchronous nature of the program benefits students wanting to earn a degree, and what it takes to break into the field.

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CUNY ASAP STEM Career Event

A few months ago a former student of mine, Caroline Mendez, reached out to me to see if I would be interested in participating in a LaGuardia virtual event to promote STEM professions to students of color. Caroline studied digital media with me back in the early 2000s shortly after I made the switch from corporate IT to academia. She is currently an Academic Advisor for the Accelerated Study in Associate Programs (ASAP) and is tasked with helping students, particularly students of color, find their way by providing intensive academic advisement, career development, tuition scholarships, textbooks, and transportation assistance. Since I love reconnecting with former students, I eagerly agreed to join the panel discussion on STEM career opportunities.

Continue reading “CUNY ASAP STEM Career Event”
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New Media Alumni Profiles – Arin Soukoule

This is another in a series of former student profiles that I am putting together. Arin is an alumnus of the LaGuardia Community College New Media Technology Program and a former student of mine. During the pandemic, they were kind enough to speak with me via Zoom and talk about their experience as a former student of the program to assist current students in finding their way to a post-LaGuardia world.

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New Media Alumni Profiles – Will Domingue

Will is an alumnus of the LaGuardia Community College New Media Technology Program and a former student of mine. During the pandemic, he was kind enough to speak with me via Zoom and talk about his experience as a former student of the program to assist current New Media students in finding their way to a post-LaGuardia world.

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Mentoring Black Males in STEM: an interview

During the height of the pandemic, I was approached by a colleague to be interviewed for an article she was writing on the trials and successes of mentoring young black males in the STEM and STE(a)M fields. The video above is a part of the discussion we had on the subject.

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VHS Massacre Too is still getting noticed!

My friend Tom Seymour hit me up today to let me know that he was interviewed about his award-winning documentary, VHS Massacre Too, on the Music is Life Podcast. I was fortunate enough to be featured in the documentary and spoke to issues of Blaxploitation Films and the state of the independent film industry. Tom made it a point to let me know that I got shouted out during a few points in the interview.

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Pruitt-Igoe Documentary Film panel

A few months back a former colleague invited me to speak to a group of students from the School of Architecture Planning and Landscape at Newcastle University (UK) about the documentary on the Pruitt Igoe apartment complex in St. Louis. The documentary, and the subsequent panel discussion, centered on the deep social issues of housing in American cities, and how these developments reflect underlying racial prejudice and inequality in the US and beyond.

The documentary can be found at:
https://vimeo.com/ondemand/thepruittigoemyth/276600370

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Thanks, I needed that today.

Every time I start questioning my choice of career, and I have been doing it a lot lately, I get a message like this from a former student and start to think that maybe the last 20 years of my professional life haven’t been a total waste of time.