Transportation, aerospace, and even U.S. Congress: Gabrielle Torina ’19 had gained impressive work experience across a wide variety of fields—but she was ready to focus her work and build her career. Even before she earned her undergraduate degree at Judson University in 2017, Torina was attending open houses for Northwestern’s MS in Communication program. She
Growing up, Jason DeSanto, senior lecturer at Northwestern University, enjoyed getting up in front of a classroom full of his peers. Part of the Illinois high school forensics circuit, he looked forward to the thrill of participating in organized public speaking events. “I enjoyed the process of thinking about what allowed people to connect with
As a management consultant working constantly with virtual and geographically dispersed teams, I have experienced firsthand how, in the last few weeks, being an effective virtual team manager has become more crucial than ever. Many companies have had to accommodate and transition to become almost 100% virtual organizations overnight, having to modify processes and operations
Every single day during this COVID-19 pandemic, there’s another press conference to watch… often with dread. Not just because of the dramatic statistics, dire predictions and the concern and fear they cause, but also for the missed opportunities to reach people, deliver the information needed to be safe, or comfort a nation in shock. Those
Shortly after 9/11, Lauren Pedi ’19 stopped at her local hospital to ask about volunteer opportunities. She had recently moved from Detroit to Chicago—where her family was from—to work full-time at an architecture firm. She was thankful for the job, given the current climate, but felt like something was missing. Maybe spending time in a
As the youngest of six, Chris Block ’18 appreciates the fact that his parents were able to provide financial assistance to all of their children to get them through college. With three electrical engineers, a math teacher, and a physics teacher as siblings, Block felt a little out of place since he didn’t share those
Growing up in an Iowa farm town, Mia Roberts ’19 couldn’t have imagined the opportunities waiting for her after graduating from Graceland University: managing magazines for the Women’s National Basketball Association, working for the Olympic Games in Atlanta and Sydney, and helping Encyclopedia Britannica transition to digital content. The desire for a master’s degree was
Sam Wijeyakumar ’19 cares about education in a “hard-core way,” as she describes it. And for good reason: Education saved her life. She was a good student but dropped out of high school in the mid-1990s, becoming a victim of human trafficking. Her tenacity won out; she eventually finished high school and began college in
Ivan Jaime ’20 believes in putting in hard work, no matter the situation. As he earned his diploma and went on to study marketing at the University of Texas at Austin, he was also working his way up at supermarket chain H-E-B. Starting out as a bagger, he had risen through the ranks to central
Irving Rein earned his PhD from the University of Pittsburgh and is currently a Professor of Communication Studies at Northwestern University. His primary research and teaching interests are popular culture, crisis management, and place marketing. He is also the author of many books on effective communication strategies, and currently researching the distribution and content changes
