Longwood University Communication Studies

Yet another one of our very own success stories, Hannah Meadors, is out in the workforce making Communication Studies proud. After graduating in 2015, Hannah started working for a public relations firm called Breaking Limits in North Carolina. When the company went out of business, her former supervisor helped her to find her current job at CSM Production as a special events manager.

Hannah started at CSM Production in April 2018 and, among other accounts, was put in charge of handling all things Daimler Freightliner. This company has taken one of their old freight trailers and turned it into a mobile bar that makes appearances at NASCAR races throughout the country. Not only does the trailer travel but it comes with an exclusive event that requires a lot of planning and hard work to produce. That is where Hannah comes in. She is responsible for these events from start to finish.

“Daimler goes to about ten of these NASCAR races per year, it is my job to travel to these events and make sure it all goes according to plan.”

The process starts with calling the racetrack and making sure there is a spot reserved for the trailer as well as various other details. She then contacts the client for a guest list and to make sure they are prepared for the event. Then it is on to organizing the catering, equipment rentals, and deliveries. Hannah maintains the backend work as well, including a budget and event proposal. Finally, Hannah gets to travel all over the country to makes sure that these events take place without any issue.

“Talladega Superspeedway would probably be my favorite NASCAR track I have been to so far. It is one of the longest and fastest tracks in the series, which also makes it one of the most competitive. In addition to the exciting races, the atmosphere around the track is electric. You can tell the fans that attend that race eat, breath, and live NASCAR. They are some of the most dedicated fans making it an experience you can’t forget. Talladega Superspeedway was also the first track I traveled to after starting at CSM Production so it will always have a special place in my heart.”

When asked what prepared Hannah for the position, she said it was making the most of her time here at Longwood and truly taking advantage of the resources that were available to her. This included her time in the PRSSA as well as maintaining close relationships with her professors and staying active.

Hannah also had this advice to give the upcoming graduating class: “Stay open-minded, don’t shoot down an opportunity just because it is not exactly what you are looking for because it may end up leading you to something better than you could have ever imagined.”

We are very proud of our COMMunity’s graduates, and we look forward to seeing where life takes Hannah Meadors as well as all of our alumni!

As Longwood University expands so do all of our wonderful departments and programs. With much focus devoted to the digital media side of the department with the studio facilities, there is now time for the public relations concentration to further develop a program to help students and community members: LAMP.

Established in 2017, the Longwood Academy for Event and Meeting Planning (LAMP) program was developed to help give more attention to those in the major and the community who have a desire to work in event planning. It started out as a one-day conference and now in its third year, has now grown to a multi-day conference, workshop, and networking opportunity! The workshop consists of professionals in varying areas of event planning teaching its attendees what it takes to work in this profession. These professionals are experts in their field with hands-on experience that they’re excited to share with the attendees. Workshop topics include establishing client expectations and setting goals, creating and managing budgets, contracting with vendors, managing technology and audio/visual, developing an event timeline, marketing and branding your event, event execution and problem-solving.

This year we have senior Communication Studies intern Suzanne Sauter helping coordinate the workshop: “I think adding a LAMP program is a great idea because so many of our students have interests outside the traditional strategic public relations umbrella. Many students have interests in event or wedding so this program will be beneficial for them. This will let comm students with an opportunity to get hands on experience from the leading professionals from a variety of occupations in the PR field. I’m really excited to be planning this with Dr. Hosterman! It’s giving me a lot of practice with event planning and facilitation of large scale, multi day events. I can’t wait to see how this program turns out” says Sauter.

This year will be a three-day event with guest speakers including:

• Ashley Down Burton from VCU

• Kip Olson from Cornerstone Hospitality
• Tim Vaughn from Freeman
• Berkeley Burgess from the Jack Kent Cooke Foundation
• Peggy Disney from the Peanut Council
• Emily Pilk from the Weyanoke Hotel

Upon completing the workshop, attendees will earn a certificate and 2.4 CEUs (continuing education units). There will a catered lunch and networking with guest speakers each day. LAMP offers a range of prices and registration options so head over to the Longwood website or contact Dr. Alec Hosterman (hostermanar@longwood.edu) to register today.

http://www.longwood.edu/commstudies/about/lamp/

by Alexandra Sabatini

Payton Conway (’18), a Communication Studies graduate, is showcasing her digital media skills by producing content for NFL Films and has her first piece coming out this Saturday. Here’s how she earned that honor.

Longwood University graduate Payton Conway (’18), is the most recent success story for Communication Studies department. After attending a conference featuring Courtlind Bragg, Payton was invited to attend the post-conference dinner at Macado’s where Bragg suggested she apply for the externship program at NFL Films. After applying, she was offered the position and has been making her mark ever since.

During a normal workday, you can find Payton editing material for the NFL Top 10 package, promotions for the network, or putting footage together of turf monsters (a future segment). While working for NFL Films, she has learned how to use Avid Media Composer, how to write stories that are out of her comfort zone and has sharpened her editing skills.

Though Payton has only been there a short time, she has already made quite an impression on her supervisors. Her most recent achievement is a segment that will air Saturday, November 17, 2018 at 1:00 am and again at 10:00 am on the NFL Top 10. This week’s episode is all about the ten greatest coach and quarterback duos. Payton’s contribution to the show comes in at number nine. Although she is not allowed to reveal the pair quite yet, she did let us know the duo comes from the Green Bay Packers.

Payton wanted to further he skills so she took the initiative and asked if she could create a mock segment to gain experience with editing a longer piece. Her supervisor informed her that the person working on the number nine spot had left and that Payton could take it over. Much of the research had been done so she had to piece it together and create a two to three-minute segment. The first draft she turned in was five minutes and forty seconds long. Payton expressed that the hardest part of the entire process was figuring out what to cut. The final edited version of the segment is three minutes and sixteen minutes long.

Payton credits the Communication Studies department with her editing, research, and creative skills. She says that without her production classes, and her time at the Rotunda, for she would not been ready for her externship.

You can check out the work of Longwood University alumni Payton Conway at 1:00 am and again at 10:00 am on the NFL Network.

By Alexandra Sabatini

Adjacent to Longwood University’s northeast corner of campus, across from French Hall, is the historic Hotel Weyanoke. Long known as a fixture that once welcomed Helen Keller to town, it now has a new facelift and is a welcome addition to the Farmville community.

The Hotel Weyanoke opened its doors at 1925 and served as a functioning hotel for the Farmville community until 1980. Throughout this 55-year span, the hotel changed owners and inevitably became run down and worn out. Little to no renovations made at the time, Longwood University used it for sororities to live in. From then on, the hotel was known for its extravagant sorority life and wild parties. Unfortunately, the already run-down hotel beginning to deteriorate further.

Victoria Walker (’15) lived in the hotel in its final years with her sorority sisters. According to Walker, it was extreme

ly dirty when she moved in, the elevator did not work, and the hotel was not easily accessible.

But in 2013, the Hotel Weyanoke was taken over by Garrett Shifflett and Ross Ficken and has been completely renovated. What once was sorority housing has now turned into an upscale boutique hotel run by Cornerstone Hospitality with many amenities. The hotel is complete with 70 luxury hotel rooms and four modern restaurants. The Catbird, the rooftop bar, has become popular among Farmville residents as well as the students at Longwood University. Sassafras is a walk up coffee shop specifically geared to the students of Longwood. For a more upscale dining experience, there is Campagna, an elegant Italian restaurant in place of the old 202 bar. Finally, they have put in a pizza kitchen called First Call where brick oven pizza is the highlight of their menu.

Though the sororities of Longwood University may miss their housing many of the people in the town feel as though the Hotel Weyanoke is better than ever. Victoria also believed this change was necessary and good for the town. Recently, she came back to Farmville and stayed in the new hotel: “I actually stayed in one of the rooms when I was moving my brother into Virginia Tech. I stayed in the room right next to the one I lived in and I absolutely love what they have done with the hotel. I think it is a really cool place for alumni to come visit and stay.”

The next time you’re in town, come by, grab a coffee, and check out this bit of Farmville’s history.

By Alexandra Sabatini

This year the Communication Studies department gains a new member to our family: Dr. Erin Waggoner. Her goal here at Longwood University is to create a home here in Farmville and in the COMMunity.

Erin was an English professor in Kentucky during her time teaching there, Waggoner realized that she did not want to teach literature forever and enjoyed the human communication aspect of it even more. That is when she decided to pursue her PhD in Communication Studies at the University of Connecticut.

After graduating, Waggoner was hired on here at Longwood University as a Lecturer. Currently, she teaches MEDIA IN SOCIETY and PUBLIC SPEAKING but there is more to come. Next semester she will be teaching DIGITAL EDITING as well as MEDIA WRITING and a course she and Dr. Naomi are developing that focuses on the LGBTQ community in the media: “The course is looking at the sociological, economical and governmental impact of the LGBTQ representation interweave.”

For Dr. Waggoner this is a dream course that she has always wanted to teach. In addition, this will be a new Perspectives course in Civitas that will also fulfill the goal nine requirement of the current general education curriculum. This means that students outside of the major will be able to take the course and get a sneak peak into our major.

Thanks to Erin, the department’s infatuation with Funco Pops continues to grow. While she does not have quite the collection that Professor Jeff Halliday has, she is coming close. But unlike Jeff, she keeps her collection in the box: “It breaks my heart when I take things out of boxes but I love the way Halliday displays his.”

Dr. Waggoner has already proven herself to be a great fit to our COMMunity and we look forward to all she has to offer!

by Alex Sabatini

This year we at Longwood University honored Bill Stuart in the 6^th annual 44 for Bill. On September 9th, 2012 Longwood University lost its very first professor for the Communications Department. Bill Stuart was an amazing human being that touched the lives of many students and faculty members during his thirteen years at Longwood University. One friend went so far as to say he spread love on everything he touched.

44 for Bill is the annual event that Amy Stuart, Bill’s wife, created after he passed away. On September 9th every year students are challenged to perform a random act of kindness in Bill’s memory. Amy created this event to continue to spread the love and positivity that Bill spread throughout his life. Being that he built Longwood’s communication department he called himself the “Comm Father”. Even to those who did not have the pleasure of knowing Bill Stuart he is still a part of our lives and our experience in the communications department. The students within the communication department know this day well. The current professors do well to inform the students of what it means to participate in 44 for Bill. These acts of kindness can be as small as holding a door from someone or giving someone a random compliment or as large as donating to charity or doing some community service.

Amy and her children dedicate their entire day each September 9th to 44 for Bill. Each year Amy will take out a certain amount of money that goes toward performing her acts of kindness. This year she split it up among each of her children and told them to see how many nonperishable food items they could purchase for that amount of money. She made it into a fun competition for her children and was able to donate food to those in need.

Amy’s favorite 44 for Bill was about two years ago. Amy had someone wave her down to inform her that one of her brake lights was out. She immediately took her car to the shop to have it fixed. As she was waiting on the repair a technician came out to inform an elderly woman that her car would not pass inspection due to her brakes. The woman asked how much it would be to fix and after hearing the price told the man, she could not afford the repairs. Amy knew then that Bill was placing her act of kindness in front of her because the amount of money it was going to take to fix the woman’s breaks was the exact amount Amy had taken out of the bank for her 44 for Bill. After seeing firsthand the power of this annual event, the service cashier then chose to make his 44 for Bill be covering Amy’s cost for the repairs on her vehicle.

44 for Bill is a special day where people remember the wonderful man Bill Stuart was and, in his memory, we commit random acts of kindness. For those who think it stops there, they are missing the point. These random acts of kindness are meant to spread like wildfire so that it extends past 44 for Bill and into our everyday lives. September 9th is just a reminder to do what we should be doing every day.

By Alex Sabatini

As students, we look to our professors for guidance and to give us the tools we need to make it in the real world. We often forget our mentor’s lives are not solely based on our success. Professors have the same breaks as we do. So what did they do this past summer?

This summer, Dr. Ryan Stouffer married his girlfriend of two years, Dr. Leah Shilling. The wedding was held with just him and Leah along with the officiator and a photographer who doubled as the witness. As they had planned, they were married with their feet in the sand and were blessed with a ceremonial blowing of a conch shell: “They did it all, so we went down to Key West, went to the courthouse, and then they married us on the beach in front of a bunch of random people.”

Wedding in Key West

Shortly after, the two were excited to announce the pregnancy of their first child. The baby is due on February 21st, 2019. Congratulations Ryan and Leah!

Dr. Isabel Fay spent her summer in Germany visiting her parents and traveling around Europe. While in Germany she took a spontaneous trip to see Beyoncé with a friend and were able to purchase last-minute tickets for $20. She also worked preparing for her Public Relations Writing course: “No matter where I was, I worked in Spain at the beach and even there I was working.”

While students were in Virginia battling July’s heat wave, Dr. Naomi Johnson and her husband, Greg Tsigaridas, were enjoying much cooler temps visiting Yellowstone National Park. In addition to her trip to Wyoming, Dr. Johnson worked closely on a research project with Dr. Alec Hosterman and Dr. Ryan Stouffer that focuses on the #MeToo movement.

“We have been analyzing social support which is basically how people support one another during times of crisis or health issues. We analyzed how social support is communicated as part of the #MeToo movement on Twitter.”

Dr. Johnson expressed that their findings showed in the first three months the support given was focused on providing resources and in the second three months was focused on providing emotional support. They will soon be submitting their work in hopes of getting published.

Finally, Professor Jeff Halliday is returning from his spring sabbatical with probably the most interesting story yet: an encounter with an alligator!

“I did not know that alligators existed in North Carolina until I went to go fishing on my first night there. I went fishing and I attracted the attention of an alligator. That was really scary.”

Professor Halliday said that as he was looking at the alligator he started googling whether they really lived in North Carolina to make sure he was really seeing an alligator. As the sun set, the alligator began coming closer to him and that is when he knew it was time to leave. Thankfully he returned to teach fresh new faces in the COMMunity.

Though all of our professors here at Longwood University work very hard, it is always fun to have a peek into their lives during the summer.