Betsey tells MC Alumni Blog what's new in the department

Stacy,

I had so much fun this weekend at Kelly Craig’s wedding. Needless to say she looked beautiful marrying the son of the publisher of the Northeast Georgian Newspaper. Three people in her wedding party included Darlene Wyant, Galia Saravalli and Sharon Wheaton, Bowie Wheaton’s wife. I saw Bowie as well. Everyone was super and it was so wonderful to see them. Darlene is working with two marketing firms and doing some film. Galia is moving to Spain next week to work in TV production over there hopefully. Bowie is manager of Chili’s in Atlanta which is the most successful restaurant in their chain in Georgia. As you can imagine, he is a terrific manager of people. Sharon is working as a graphic designer. He told me Mark is teaching 5th grade and loves it. I’m sure the kids feed off his energy. I tried to get them to call me Betsey instead of Dr. Blakeslee but it’s tough. I told them how you and I (Stacy) have had lunch with alumni and make them practice calling us by our first names.

We are launching our newly designed web site this week and it will have a web cam in the newsroom so if you’re bored (alumni) you can check on the current mass comm students to see if they’re working as hard as you did!

Mary Verdery started this week as our new assistant in the department.

Stacy is a Senator, part of the new faculty senate at Piedmont. Only 16 faculty members were elected.

Candice Felice is doing a super job of producing great work for Georgia Public Broadcasting in the GPR studios here on the campus.

This week we start our fall film series in the screening room. We’re showing The Diving Bell and the Butterfly which won Golden Globe Best Picture last year and Best Director Academy Award.

Several of the mass comm students are studying In Nottingham England this semester and several more will go next semester.

The newspaper ( now called the Navigator- thanks to Brandon Ridgway) is posted and updated every two weeks on line at www.piedmontnavigator.com .

We met with a bunch of students last week from the Athens campus that are going to start doing the Athens page of the newspaper and the yearbook and magazine.

TV Piedmont runs 24/7 now and the programming improves all the time. The green screen is up and running along with our new graphics system.

I will close by saying that it’s so great to see former alumni. Every one of you contributed to the success this department has become and if you hadn’t slogged it out in our crazy small closets and moldy converted classrooms/ TV studios we wouldn’t be in this building. You are all a part of this fabulous complex.

-Betsey