Information Science

Data plans

Regan Widergren — Tue, 18 Nov 2025 22:03:01 +0000

Data plans Regan Widergren Tue, 11/18/2025 - 15:03

Hannah Stewart

Photos by Kimberly Coffin and Patrick Campbell

When Josie Mahoney’s best friend died in high school, his parents asked for her help with
heir son’s social media.

Of course, she said yes, but she didn’t know where to start. Should they delete his account, losing access to the photos he posted and was tagged in? Or archive it as a digital memorial?

“It was distressing,” said Mahoney (InfoSci’25). “I think a clinic would’ve been really great because at least there’s someone to talk to who knows what they’re doing.”

Now she’s one of those people: In her senior year, she joined CMDI’s Digital Legacy Clinic, led by Jed Brubaker, an associate professor of information science.

“The clinic is something you can’t bottle—there’s an energy there,” she said. “It’s the coolest class I’ve been a part of because of how it prepares us for the real world.”

Part of that is how the course is structured. Brubaker builds in collaborative, project-based assignments that mimic the workplaces Mahoney and her classmates will graduate into. But it also comes from the market need for a solution to what happens to our data when we die.

As an academic research collaborator at Facebook, Brubaker helped develop the platform’s memorial account practices, but saw a much larger problem than just social media—photos, videos, text messages, bank accounts and so on. Through a National Science Foundation CAREER Grant, he created a pro-bono, law school-style clinic to help people maintain their digital legacies.

“It felt like a really unique moment where my research, teaching missions and a desire to do public service perfectly overlapped,” he said.

‘Pre-mortem’ support

Many clients come to the Digital Legacy Clinic in search of what students call “pre-mortem” support—getting a handle on what to do with their data now, so their families don’t have as much stress later.

I appreciated the students’ compassion and that they’re thinking about ways to mitigate the overwhelm.”

Corinna Robbins

That was the case with Corinna Robbins.

“I wonder what will happen to all the digital detritus that feels meaningful to us, and I wonder how my family will handle mine, or how I should handle my parents’,” Robbins said. “My son is 16 right now. He may not be interested in my inner life at this moment, but I bet one
day he will be.”

Unlike her mother, who had a drawer or two full of family photos, Robbins said she had thousands of unorganized photos on about 25 hard drives. That alone felt daunting, but equally disappointing was losing a blog she kept as a young adult, filled with personal essays and photography.

With help from the students, she learned about different cloud solutions to organize her photo collection, as well as the Wayback Machine, an online archive where she was able to recover most of her blog.

“It was lovely to be reconnected with those artifacts of my younger, former self,” Robbins said. “I appreciated the students’ compassion and that they’re thinking about ways to mitigate the overwhelm.”

Students in the Digital Legacy Clinic provide client support while researching how different platforms treat user data after death.

‘A measly number’

Part of the clinic’s effort is dedicated to fieldwork, in which students review platforms’ policies for specifics on user accounts and data after death. They’ve found that only 13% of platforms offer functional support, “a measly number for something that will happen to 100% of us,” Brubaker said.

The rest of their time is spent on client cases and building out the clinic’s functionality. Jack Manning (CTD’24), an information science master’s student, built a chatbot to push students’ boundaries, ensuring they encounter a range of situations and build their confidence for working with clients who may be grieving.

“These are undergraduate students, not mental health professionals,” he said. “And there’s potential for harm in those sensitive communications.”

Manning, like Mahoney, joined the clinic in the fall and repeated the class last spring. While the first semester was spent developing the framework and assessing clients’ needs, the second focused on creating a knowledge base and onboarding system—like the chatbot—to benefit future students.

As part of her portfolio project last fall, Mahoney focused on leadership and outreach—so on top of helping clients, she also developed a mini knowledge base with resources to train future students to be sensitive in working with the public.

“Now I can say I was a team leader, a project manager and in charge of the timeline and what we were doing,” she said.

Students said that real-world emphasis shows up in other ways, too.

“I’ve learned how to work with people on different teams and bounce ideas off each other,” said Oliver Kochenderfer (InfoSci’25). “I’ve gotten so much teamwork experience, and it’s been cool to have a teacher who acts as a manager guiding us toward one big goal.”

Brubaker said it’s important to remember that although college is a time of exploration and experience, one of its main responsibilities is preparing students for life after graduation.

“I hope the clinic remains a place that has a public impact while also being a place for both my students and me to learn,” he said. “I love taking humanistic or social science issues and thinking about how to implement that in the code. We’re human-touch first. More than a solution, people need to be heard.”

Learn more about the clinic

The Digital Literacy Clinic

Hannah Stewart graduated from CMDI in 2019 with a degree in communication. She covers student news for the college.

Photographer Kimberly Coffin graduated from CMDI in 2018 with degrees in media production and strategic communication.

When Jed Brubaker established the Digital Legacy Clinic—to help people make a plan for their data after their deaths—he saw it as a perfect blend of teaching and public service.

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10 for 10: Centers making an impact

Amanda J. McManus — Mon, 17 Nov 2025 21:20:40 +0000

10 for 10: Centers making an impact Amanda J. McManus Mon, 11/17/2025 - 14:20

Centers and labs at CMDI are important not just because of the insights discovered by the researchers and creatives working within them, but because of the impact they offer to the public.

Here are some signature labs and centers from CMDI’s first decade.

Center for Communication and Democratic Engagement: Aims to learn from deliberation, dialogue and educational events tied to communication and democratic practice.
Center for Documentary and Ethnographic Media: Creates opportunities for the public to engage with documentary films, especially through the signature Mimesis festival, in Boulder.
Center for Environmental Journalism: Journalists who complete a fellowship from the center have been responsible for award-winning work on environmental issues.
Center for Media, Religion and Culture: Studies the complex relationship between media and religion in an entangled world.
Community Engagement, Design and Research Center: Partners with communities at home and abroad to build resilient, equitable cities and neighborhoods.
Immersive Media Lab: Invites people to explore augmented and virtual reality environments to develop different perspectives on emerging challenges.
Media Archaeology Lab: A peerless collection of obsolete, but functional, technology to experiment with and imagine roads not taken in tech and society.
Neuro D Lab: Explores the intersection of design, neurodiversity, equity and innovation to ensure designs—from products to wayfinding—work intuitively for all users.
Sustainability and Storytelling Lab: Aims to understand how stories influence the ways we practice sustainability and shame unsustainable methods.
Visual Evidence Lab: Studies how the legal system can be better equipped to handle video and photographic evidence presented in court, including deepfakes and generative A.I.

Here are 10 centers and labs that have created public impact in the college’s first decade.

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10 for 10: Notable newsmakers

Amanda J. McManus — Fri, 14 Nov 2025 06:11:51 +0000

10 for 10: Notable newsmakers Amanda J. McManus Thu, 11/13/2025 - 23:11

Because of the multidisciplinary nature of their work—and their fearlessness in confronting the biggest problems—CMDI faculty are regularly featured in local and national media. Here are 10 times over the past decade when major news outlets have featured our faculty.

The New Republic: Nathan Schneider wrote an essay on the Slow Food movement, arguing a slow computing approach could repair our experiences with technology. May 19, 2015.
The Denver Post: Chris Vargo studied Twitter data to see how vaccine misinformation spread and took hold in particular American communities. Sept. 27, 2017.
The Washington Post: Angie Chuang wrote an op-ed on the problems her race and journalism class tries to solve, and the struggle businesses like Starbucks have faced in confronting them. June 13, 2018.
Forbes: Casey Fiesler sat for a Q&A on the need for ethics in the technology industry, particularly social media. Jan. 14, 2021.
The Guardian: Elizabeth Skewes talked about her research on whether news media covering school shootings influences future acts of violence. May 12, 2023.
Scientific American: Leysia Palen talked about the dangers of information isolation during disasters that knock out telecommunications services. Sept. 11, 2023.
KUNC/NPR: Josh Shepperd talked about the history and influence of public media, especially amid great economic change in the journalism industry. April 10, 2024.
The New York Times: Following the publication of her most recent book, on romance writing, Chris Larson explained the circumstances behind the breakup of Romance Writers of America. July 24, 2024.
The Associated Press: Erin Willis was interviewed about her work on patient influencers and the language used in pharmaceuticals advertising. Nov. 14, 2024.
Denver7 (ABC): Jed Brubaker discussed the launch of the Digital Legacy Clinic and the need to proactively manage our digital footprints before we die. Dec. 11, 2024.

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10 for 10: Projects that inspire

Amanda J. McManus — Mon, 29 Sep 2025 05:34:46 +0000

10 for 10: Projects that inspire Amanda J. McManus Sun, 09/28/2025 - 23:34 Hannah Stewart

CMDI students develop their creative, analytical and investigative skills through hands-on projects that prepare them for the challenges they’ll encounter at work. Here are 10 impressive projects from the college’s first decade, along with a look at where these students are now.

Jacob Glazier (StratComm’17) worked with fellow advertising students to create CU’s commercial The Moment Before, which ran during football games and on television.

He is a freelance director and cinematographer, with some of his work gaining recognition at the Denver Film and Best Short festivals, among others.

Tessa Diestel (Jour’18) was on the 2018 Carnegie-Knight News21 fellowship team that covered “Hate in America,” which received a Murrow award, among others. The fellowship brings together top journalism students nationwide to report and produce in-depth, multimedia projects for major news outlets.

Diestel and Ashley Hopko (Jour’19) worked with students from 19 universities, reporting on hate crimes, racism and intolerance in 36 states. Diestel is currently an associate producer at ESPN.

Francesca Rubin (Comm’19) was director of partnerships for the 2019 TEDxCU event—the first time the annual speaker series was organized entirely by the college. She and her team secured sponsorships from various companies to support the event.

She is now an account executive at the fundraising consulting firm Hudson Farris, in New York City.

Megan Weber (StratComm’19) was on the Project Reface team that won gold at the national 2018 Young Ones award show organized by The One Club.

She is currently at the advertising agency McCann, in New York City, working as an art director.

Julia Muell and Megan Lange (both StratComm’21) won gold at the national 2019 Young Ones show for their Inspired World campaign.

Muell now works as an art director at Wieden + Kennedy, in New York City; Lange is a copywriter for TBWA\Chiat\Day, in Los Angeles.

Max Gannett (InfoSci’22, MS’23) and Jay Ghosh (InfoSci’22) completed a data visualization project that analyzed more than 600,000 tweets to identify target audiences of disinformation campaigns.

“The meaning and work learned on this project launched a friendship that allowed us to start a company and keep combining politics and data science to create change,” Gannett said.

That company, Washington-based Delphi Intelligence LLC, offers data science consulting services; in addition to his work with Delphi, Gannett is a special assistant in the U.S. Senate.

Audrey Mayes (MMediaSt’22) launched a podcast, Where the Aud Things Are, highlighting rural perspectives related to wildlife conservation, as the final project of her master’s program.

She then hosted Remington’s podcast as a marketing manager with the Kinetic Group before transitioning to the health and wellness space. She currently serves as the director of marketing and strategy at Lifeplus.

Reporter Hannah Prince (Jour’22) and photojournalist Alex Levy (Jour’22) investigated fentanyl use for a reporting honors project, which was published in a collaboration between the CU Independent and The Bold.

After pursuing a career in public relations, Levy switched to product marketing and is now with Zayo Group; he also runs a professional cycling program.

Prince is a segment producer of special events at ABC News, covering daily news and producing major U.S. and international news coverage. She embedded with ABC’s investigative unit in Uvalde, Texas, to report on gun violence following the 2022 school shooting, and was an associate producer for the Emmy-winning news documentary It Happened Here—A Year in Uvalde.

Jordan Wirfs-Brock (MJour’11, PhDInfoSci’22) wrote an article for Inside Energy, a collaborative journalism initiative, that includes a history of U.S. coal production set to music. She is an assistant professor of computer science at Whitman College, teaching students creative, multisensory ways to communicate data.

She is working on an NSF-funded project to develop tools that allow people to reflect on the sounds in their lives.

Virtual reality experiences in her classes inspired skiing instructor Natanya Chatfield (CritMedia’24) to create Virtual Slopes: Adaptive Ski Adventure at Eldora Mountain. The project—a first-person skiing journey for VR headsets and YouTube—makes adaptive skiing more accessible by breaking down barriers people with disabilities face in starting the sport. She is now a social media intern with a local Denver studio.

Hannah Stewart graduated from CMDI in 2019 with a degree in communication. She covers student news for the college.

Here are 10 student projects from the college’s first decade and where those alumni are now.

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10 for 10: Alumni who impress

Amanda J. McManus — Fri, 26 Sep 2025 21:25:06 +0000

10 for 10: Alumni who impress Amanda J. McManus Fri, 09/26/2025 - 15:25 Malinda Miller

CMDI counts alumni from disciplines like journalism, communication and advertising as part of its history, meaning its impact goes back more than a century. But even in just the 10 years since its official founding, the college has produced some incredible graduates and amazing stories. Here are some of our favorites.

Drake Brown (StratComm’18)
Manager, Digital and Social Media, KPMG US, Philadelphia

Brown tells KPMG’s story through social and digital media channels. Experiences from classes and an Ogilvy & Mather internship helped him land an agency job after graduation.

“My capstone class was a value-add to my career. At my first agency job, I was thrown into multiple new business pitches, and it didn’t feel like it was my first time interfacing and presenting to an external client.”

Troy Fairbanks (CritMedia’18)
Owner of both Fairbanks Films and Rise Aerials, Denver

When Fairbanks entered college he was already freelancing, and he now owns and operates two companies. Fairbanks Films specializes in video production for sports, corporate work, documentaries, livestreams, and event coverage; Rise Aerials focuses on high-end aerial cinematography.

“All the different projects for class were exciting, and it felt so fun and fluid. Many were projects I wouldn't normally create on my own, so it was a really good exercise to broaden my skills. When I graduated, I had 10 to 15 videos for my portfolio.”

Jasi Les (Comm’18)
Enterprise Account Director, LinkedIn, San Francisco

After nearly a decade in tech—from startups to global brands— Les manages more than $4 million in business for LinkedIn across 30 strategic enterprise accounts. She works with executives to understand their challenges and gaps, then builds business cases of how LinkedIn products can help.

“My degree has made me a multidimensional communicator. I can speak very technically with a development team, then meet with a Fortune 500 executive and translate that message.”

Sophie Burgess (EnvDes’19)
Senior Landscape Architect, SLR Consulting, Edinburgh, Scotland

Since joining SLR in May, Burgess has worked on the best way to implement onshore substations for offshore wind farms across the United Kingdom while doing justice to the historical and local character of the areas where those projects are installed.

“It goes back to everything I learned in ENVD and at college—making sure your designs and the way you implement things are thoughtful and intentional, and trying your best to problem solve with the codes you're given.”

Katy Fetters Gaastra (MMediaSt’19)
Founder, Cerebral Palsy Strong, Portland, Oregon

Gaastra runs a nonprofit for adults with disabilities that includes an online platform based on sharing stories and connection, and a growing number of in-person events.

“I came to CU with a very specific goal—to understand how to become a better community organizer, storyteller and leader. The master’s in media and public engagement allowed me to explore how to do that with more intention, and how to build a narrative around a social justice movement to increase disability representation in a positive way.”

Cole Pates (CritMedia’19)
Global Video Director, The North Face, Denver

Pates’ day-to-day involves managing production for seasonal campaigns within the company. It’s a job that often requires on-the-spot problem-solving as the team tackles outdoor shoots under changing conditions.

“When I was in college, I assumed as long as I had a camera and something to go take a picture or video of, I was fine. But as you gain experience, and the productions get larger, you realize there’s a time and a place for what you learned in class. You start to understand roles and responsibilities, and how those factor in to accomplish the goal.”

Cheyenne Smith (StratComm’20)
Creative Producer, Chey Smith Media LLC, Boulder

Smith manages campaigns, produces commercials and creates social media content for outdoor brands—such as REI, Osprey and Teva—as a freelancer. She has also stayed connected with Pathways to Excellence, CMDI’s summer intensive program that prepares students for college.

“I love watching Pathways students find what they are passionate about, because that’s what helped light me up when I was in the program.”

Vinay Simlot (Jour, AeroEngr’21)
Washington Correspondent, Nexstar TV, Washington, D.C.

Following three years at a local station in Tennessee, Simlot now covers national politics and produces stories for local stations. Once in a while, he gets to use his aerospace engineering background for stories on space.

“I was ready to jump into local news because of NewsTeam. We learned how to work on the fly. We learned how to put stuff together on deadline. We learned to be flexible. And we learned every job in the newsroom—to report, anchor, produce, everything.”

Janghee Cho (PhD Info’23)
Assistant Professor, College of Design and Engineering, National University of Singapore

Cho researches and teaches in the areas of human-computer interaction and social computing with a focus on the role of future technologies in our everyday lives—research he began as a Meta fellow. He also directs the Joyful Experience in Design and Interaction Lab.

“The information science department studies emerging technology from a sociocultural—not just a technical—perspective. It opened my eyes to understanding humans in a different way to influence design—to think more critically about the design.”

Bianca Zamora Perez (Comm, MediaSt’24)
PhD student, University of Pennsylvania Annenberg School for Communication, Philadelphia

Perez is continuing research she started at CMDI. Through the lens of copyright and labor, she studies authorship in relation to how an individual’s images and text—especially wage workers with marginalized identities—are training generative A.I. models without compensation.

“My time in CMDI gave me the books, theories and knowledge I need to perform academically. The college also introduced me to professors who saw me as both a student and a person they cared about. They supported me throughout the journey of finding my voice and using it.”

Malinda Miller graduated from the College of Arts and Sciences with a degree in English in 1992 and Master's in Journalism in 1998.

CMDI boasts more than a century of history—meaning alumni in journalism, advertising and communication have gone on to truly incredible careers. But even just looking at graduates from the 10 years the college has existed showcases some amazing stories. Here are some of our favorites.

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In its milestone year, CMDI welcomes more than a dozen new faculty

Joe Arney — Fri, 15 Aug 2025 20:40:01 +0000

In its milestone year, CMDI welcomes more than a dozen new faculty Joe Arney Fri, 08/15/2025 - 14:40

Joe Arney

Kevin Hoth is among the new faculty at CMDI this fall, though he's been lecturing at the university since 2011. ‘It feels like a perfect home for me; I’m very grateful to be with such a forward-thinking department,’ he says. Photo by Hannah Howell.

Kevin Hoth probably knows what it’s like for a longtime AAA pitcher to at last get the call to join the big leagues.

Hoth has been teaching at ��Ҵ�ý�ƽ�� since 2011—originally as part of the ATLAS Institute—but this fall, he joins the critical media practices department at the College of Communication, Media, Design and Information as an assistant teaching professor.

“I’m so excited to have this department as my home on a more permanent basis,” said Hoth, previously a lecturer in critical media practices. “It feels like a perfect home for me; I’m very grateful to be with such a forward-thinking department.”

Hoth is one of 14 new professors to join CMDI this fall, bringing experience in artificial intelligence, surveillance studies, technology, journalism and more to the college. Coincidentally, the college is celebrating the 10th anniversary of its founding this year.

Lori Bergen, founding dean of CMDI, said while the quantity of new faculty is impressive, it’s the quality that helps this group stand out.

“I am so impressed with the credentials our new faculty are bringing to the college,” Bergen said. “Whether it’s their published work, varied research interests or boundless enthusiasm for teaching young people and preparing them for professional and person success after college, I know we have an impressive group that will create a lasting impact on the college and university.”

The full lineup of new faculty:

Ian J. Alexander, assistant professor, media studies. He researches the implementation and effects of media technologies in U.S. prisons.
Ashley Carter, assistant teaching professor, journalism. Carter earned her PhD in journalism from the college in the spring. As a a student, she took first place in a best paper competition at the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication. She has written for The Denver Post, 303 Magazine and elsewhere.
Yiran Duan, teaching professor, information science. Duan studies how different types of users shape the flow of information using machine learning models, inferential statistics and data visualizations.
Cheri Felix, assistant teaching professor, advertising, public relations and design. Felix has been a lecturer at the college since 2022. She brings varied experiences to CMDI, including work as a writer, founder and program manager.
Kevin Hoth, assistant teaching professor, critical media practices. Hoth is a fine art photographer who has won multiple grants for his work.
Erica Hunzinger, assistant teaching professor, journalism. Hunzinger has been a lecturer at the college since 2022. Her journalism experience includes work for The Associated Press, The Denver Post and elsewhere.
Seonah Kim, assistant teaching professor, media studies. She studies global discourses around racial and gender identity in media that are shaped by structural inequality.
Julia Proft, teaching professor, information science. Proft brings experience in software engineering in educational technology to the college.
Mehak Sawhney, assistant professor, media studies. Her research interests include sound and media studies, surveillance studies, and environmental humanities.
Victoria Pihl Sørensen, assistant teaching professor, media studies. Sørensen conducts research at the intersection of media studies, cultural studies, gender studies, and the history and philosophy of science and technology.
Ilana Trumble, teaching professor, information science. Trumble also is returning to Boulder, having earned her bachelor’s degree here in 2014. She is an expert in statistics and data science.
Hong Tien Vu, associate professor, journalism. Vu brings a decade of experience in journalism from living in Vietnam, including a stint with The Associated Press, to the classroom. He also is director of the college’s Center for Environmental Journalism.
Cody Walizer, assistant teaching professor, communication. Walizer has been teaching game studies, sports communication and related topics at CMDI since 2022. He specializes in debate and game studies.
Jonathan Zong, assistant professor, information science. Zong joins CMDI from the Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory at MIT. He also studied at Princeton University and was a visiting student at the University of Oxford.

Alexander said he’s excited to join the college as part of such a large group of newcomers.

“It almost feels like a cohort, which is really exciting,” he said. “And at the same time, there are folks in the media studies department who have been around awhile, so it feels like I get to join a new group, and also a good, established one.”

Alexander brings particularly interesting research to CMDI. His work studies the introduction of media technologies—radio, telephone, tablets—into the U.S. carceral system. Through his research, he’s interviewed incarcerated people over phone and video call to better understand how technology advances have been used to isolate politically active people trying to create community within—or among—prisons, or to broadcast to communities in the event of an escape.

The newest tool he’s interested in are tablets, PDFs and video visit systems, which are starting to replace letters from home and legal communications.

“I look at these technologies as tools of struggle, oppression, isolation and manipulation—but also as tools of connection,” he said. “So, for instance, the way people inside are using them to make radio shows or podcasts, produce literature, or build solidarity and community and raise political consciousness.”

It’s work that is historical in its approach, but is worth studying in the current moment—both as the nation dramatically increases investment in policing and incarceration, and with generative artificial intelligence strongly reshaping how we communicate.

“It feels like I get to join a new group, and also a good, established one.”

Ian J. Alexander, assistant professor, media studies

“Like many people who study systems of structural oppression, I wish it were less relevant,” Alexander said. “But beyond just the massive expansion of ICE, and the so-called Alligator Alcatraz, there’s a larger question around what social and political function prisons serve—and what the state is saying about itself through its carceral system.”

Proft, who was a lecturer in the information science department in the spring, said she’s excited to bring her industry experience to the classroom, especially since she worked in educational technology.

“I enjoyed that work, but the impact I was able to have was pretty far removed from the actual students,” she said. “I really value having that smaller, but closer, connection to the students.”

Information science, she said, is a comfortable fit for its attention to creating human impact. That’s something she felt she missed while studying computer science.

“I think information science is one of those things where you ask people what it is, and you get tons of different answers,” she said. “But I think having that diversity—whether it’s technical, or business, or design applications—is really important, because that brings back the more human aspects of technology. So we get away from talking about computing as a topic divorced from anything else in the world.”

She said A.I. and large language models are a topic she’s excited to explore with her students, some of whom consider the advent of LLMs as an invitation to not have to learn to code anymore. Crucially, students must learn to use these tools—but they must be taught that they are tools, not shortcuts.

“When you learn to code, you’re developing a problem-oriented mindset, and learning how to approach and solve those problems,” Proft said. “If they’re leaning on LLMs to generate code, they don’t think about what the code is actually doing, which means when something goes wrong, they can’t address it.”

Hoth, as a fine art photographer, has given plenty of consideration to A.I.’s disruptive impact on the creation of images.

“Especially in media production, A.I. is a huge concern,” he said. “But I don’t put my head in the sand and say, ‘You can’t use any of this, we’re not going to talk about it.’ We have to talk about it. We have to integrate it into our teaching and our practices. But I have to show them where the line is.”

Hoth mentioned a conversation with a past student, who used A.I. to touch up nighttime photos in a project he did that took him around the state.

“I liked that he wasn’t afraid to share that with me,” Hoth said. “In this case, these were meant to be creative pictures—he’s not a documentary photographer—and so we discussed, you couldn’t put this in the Denver Post or New York Times, but with limited usage on a creative project, this kind of tool is OK.”

A major lesson in his classes, outside of technology, is that the right kind of failure is required for growth. He often shares failures from his own career to show how getting things wrong can be helpful.

“The learning environment should be a place of safety, in terms of play and also of learning how to fail well,” he said. “If you put forth your best effort, you’re trying something new and you fail, that’s commendable. That’s how you get to great things.”

Joe Arney covers research and general news for the college.

The college is welcoming experts in artificial intelligence, surveillance studies, technology, journalism and more this fall.

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Designer label

Amanda J. McManus — Tue, 01 Jul 2025 19:11:50 +0000

Designer label Amanda J. McManus Tue, 07/01/2025 - 13:11

Joe Arney

All things CMDI

Visit our CMDI resources page for more on the college name and FAQs about the opportunities this change will afford to students and alumni.

Photos by Kimberly Coffin (CritMedia, StratComm'18)

Art by Cuauhtémoc Campos

A childhood trek to visit Aztec temples in Mexico was the first time Cuauhtémoc Campos thought about a future in architecture.

It wasn’t the last.

Long before the first-year landscape architecture student set foot on the University of Colorado Boulder campus, Campos helped his father design a porch and a patio area for their home. Now, in his environmental design courses, he’s refining those skills and interests to bring his visions to life, from reusing physical space on campus to a design of his name that borrowed from those Aztec ruins that inspired him.

“Most of the projects we do are hands-on and challenge us to experiment with our creativity,” Campos said. “But also, we do a lot of presentations to prepare us for when we need to talk about our work publicly.”

He said he hopes to further strengthen his communication skills once the environmental design program becomes fully integrated with the College of Media, Communication and Information. On July 1, Campos and his peers will formally become part of CMCI, at which point the college will rebrand itself as the College of Communication, Media, Design and Information, or CMDI.

“I was a little shocked when I first heard we were becoming part of CMCI,” he said. “But I feel like the resources we’ll have from being part of the college will add more to what we’re able to learn, while hopefully introducing CMCI students to what makes ENVD special.”

An important charge for Lori Bergen, founding dean of CMCI, was structuring the integration in a way that added value for ENVD students, alumni, faculty and staff without disrupting the cultures of either entity. As a department within the college, environmental design will be able to retain its identity while benefiting from enhanced and expanded services and networks.

“When we created CMCI, we had three concepts that guided our vision—think, innovate and create,” Bergen said. “Now, as we become CMDI, those principles are just as relevant to our identity. If anything, the intensely hands-on nature of an ENVD education reinforces our mission as a college that brings different, but related, disciplines together, to help us bring interdisciplinary insights to increasingly complex problems.”

Azza Kamal, right, works with a student on a project to refresh the Boulder Dushanbe Teahouse.

First forays at collaboration

Faculty and staff from environmental design became part of the college in July 2024, so some collaboration has already begun. Azza Kamal, an associate teaching professor of sustainable planning and urban design, is working with Pat Clark, an assistant professor of critical media practices, to give her students access to the college’s Immersive Media Lab later this semester.

“In my studio, we’re working on a virtual reality/augmented reality model for retrofitting neighborhoods in Denver to comply with green building codes and emission reduction bills, and we’ll use his facility so that students can work on their models, but also to explore and get hands-on with the technology,” Kamal said. “I was going to buy the equipment, but then found out Patrick had everything we needed in his lab. And he’s just amazing—he works around our schedule, students will have access to the lab 24/7, I couldn’t ask for more.”

That kind of collaboration is something Stacey Schulte hopes faculty will build on as the players begin to work together.

“No discipline exists in a vacuum,” said Schulte, director of environmental design. “I am excited to see how environmental design will collaborate with communication- and media-related disciplines, and vice versa.

“As our students continue to create impactful work, they learn how to tell the story of their projects—the problems their designs are intending to solve, and how those solutions create positive community impact—in ways that resonate with stakeholders.”

CMCI's emphasis on communication and presentation skills has Ella Seevers excited about environmental design becoming part of the college.

Kamal said she’s still learning about the players in CMCI who would be good fits for collaboration, “but there is a lot of potential where technology meets storytelling.

“Communication has always been a challenge for architecture and planning students—how to communicate in lay terms. Helping students to take technical, complex designs and be able to tell a story through them—so their clients and the public can appreciate their vision—will be incredibly helpful in their careers.”

That’s a need students recognized, as well. Sophomore Ella Seevers, a landscape architecture student, got some professional communication experience last year, when she worked on a project for the city of Boulder and was challenged to make better use of sites along its creek path. Earlier this month, she went on a site tour and presented her vision to city officials and landscape architects working on a pop-up installation for the summer. Hers is one of three student projects that will influence the final design.

“It was an amazing experience to share our ideas and see that they were actually valued by professional designers who have been doing this for decades,” said Seevers, a teaching assistant in ENVD’s design studios and a mentor to first-year students. “So, I’ve had this opportunity to work with the city already, which is very exciting, because that usually doesn’t happen with a first-year project.

“If you can’t present your design well, and tell other people what you’re thinking and how it’s going to be implemented, then you won’t be a very effective designer,” she said.

Helping students to take technical, complex designs and be able to tell a story through them—so their clients and the public can appreciate their vision—will be incredibly helpful in their careers."
Azza Kamal
Associate Teaching Professor
Environmental Design

‘The story we live in’

While both entities value hands-on learning, critical thinking and creativity, at first glance, it may not be immediately obvious how ENVD and its four majors—architecture, environmental product design, landscape architecture, and sustainable planning and urban design—fit into CMCI. However, “when you think about the stories we hear, tell and watch, environmental design becomes another dimension of the story that we live in,” said Stephanie Marchesi, president of WE Communications, a global integrated communications firm.

“Storytelling is verbal, written and visual—but through their environmental designs, these talented individuals are bringing stories to life in 3D,” said Marchesi (Jour’85), who sits on CMCI’s advisory board. “This will be something very defining for the college, because it’s taking storytelling to new dimensions—literally.”

That’s something faculty in the college are excited to explore in depth.

“My initial reaction to the news was one of intense joy and excitement over what’s possible,” said Bryan Semaan, chair of CMCI’s information science department. “Design intersects so many different spaces. Environmental design researchers are looking at many of the same problems and topics as people across CMCI and within our disciplinary communities, but they’re operating on a scale of how humans will experience and be shaped by the natural and built environments in ways that are important to a sustainable future.”

That could be anything from a database that governs an algorithmic system to the impact of a data center on the environment and people who live nearby.

Elena Sabinson, an assistant professor of environmental design, said an important part of her program’s culture is recognizing and creating things that match the needs of their users. It’s something she works on very closely as director of the Neuro D Lab, which studies how design can trigger innovations that support wellbeing and accessibility to those who are neurodivergent.

“I would say my colleagues in ENVD are interested in bridging those mismatches between the environment and the needs of a user,” she said. “And I think CMCI is already doing a lot of that in its own way, whether it’s documentary or information science or any of those spaces.”

‘Who needs to learn about argument more?’

Alumni like Christopher Bell (PhDMediaSt’09) are watching to see how the college prepares students for the kinds of challenges he sees at work. Bell, a consultant and president of CreativityPartners LLC, said he’s excited to see student and alumni collaborations going forward, such as social media managers who can raise money and awareness for life-changing products coming out of environmental design.

“People who believe they are ‘just’ technically focused are the people who need the most instruction in communication,” said Bell, also a member of CMCI’s advisory board and an instructor who teaches courses in screenwriting and cultural studies. “Those are the people who need us the most, because they are making arguments and sending messages.

“Architecture and city planning are arguments. They’re arguments about what matters, who matters and doesn’t, how we see ourselves in relation to other people, and what is important to spend resources on. So, who needs to learn about argument more than environmental designers?”

When you think about the stories we hear, tell and watch, environmental design becomes another dimension of the story that we live in.”
Stephanie Marchesi (Jour’85)
CMCI Advisory Board member

Joe Arney covers research and general news for the college.

Photographer Kimberly Coffin graduated from CMDI in 2018 with degrees in Media Production and Strategic Communication.

Meet the College of Communication, Media, Design and Information.

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CMCI and ENVD share a tradition of hands-on learning, a thirst for innovation and a passion for solving problems in ways that move the world. Those shared values will guide them as they join together and CMCI renames itself the College of Communication, Media, Design and Information. Art by Ella Seevers.

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CMCI and ENVD share a tradition of hands-on learning, a thirst for innovation and a passion for solving problems. Those values will guide them as CMCI renames itself the College of Communication, Media, Design and Information. Art by Ella Seevers.

Congratulations, Class of 2025!

Amanda J. McManus — Wed, 28 May 2025 19:44:19 +0000

Congratulations, Class of 2025! Amanda J. McManus Wed, 05/28/2025 - 13:44

More than 900 graduates were celebrated at CMCI’s annual recognition ceremony this past May. Our newest class of Forever Buffs arrived amid pandemic and leave as outstanding scholars and accomplished leaders.

View the 2025 Graduation Celebration

William W. White honorees
Meet the most outstanding students from each CMCI major, as chosen by our faculty.

‘A rock star who is going places’
The top student in her class, Sarah Carleo, discovered her passion for public relations as a student. She’s now off to Next PR, where she previously was a standout summer intern.

Getting the message
Andrew Johnson made the most of a New York City internship with BBH USA. The top strategic communication major is thrilled to return in an account management role as he gets another bite at the Big Apple.

Bylines are fine, but…
Most college students would be thrilled at getting an Associated Press byline. So is Celia Frazier, but she measures her work in impact, not clips. She graduated as CMCI’s top journalism major.

Meet the environmental design Class of 2025
Get to know some oustanding seniors and watch the recognition ceremony.

Celebrating ENVD

Connections through design
For Serena Langdon-Dimidjian, a graduate with a dual degree in architecture and ethnic studies, design is about building community, asking deeper questions and making space for connection.

"Everything you’ve done up to this moment has prepared you to succeed in a world where you can feel the ground moving under your feet.

Lori Bergen, PhD
Founding Dean
CMCI

Our newest class of Forever Buffs arrived amid pandemic and leave as outstanding scholars and accomplished leaders.

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CMCI names its first endowed professor

Amanda J. McManus — Wed, 28 May 2025 18:24:06 +0000

CMCI names its first endowed professor Amanda J. McManus Wed, 05/28/2025 - 12:24

Joe Arney

Photos by Kimberly Coffin (CritMedia, StratComm’18)

She’s done pathbreaking research in technology ethics and internet law, has been featured in The Washington Post and NPR, and does extensive public scholarship as an outspoken expert on social media.

So, it’s no surprise that when it came to naming its first endowed professorship, the College of Media, Communication and Information turned to Casey Fiesler.

“When we created CMCI, we were energized by the vision of a college where we would study and teach not just a set of related disciplines, but the areas where those disciplines come together,” said Lori Bergen, CMCI founding dean. “Casey is a model for that. Her ethical and legal perspectives on important questions surrounding technology help us make sense of complex problems. And she is able to break down those complicated problems in ways that help the public ask more thoughtful questions about the platforms and tools they use each day.”

More: Building a better ‘bionic pancreas’

In July, Fiesler, an associate professor of information science at CMCI, will be named the William R. Payden Endowed Professor. The honor recognizes the demonstrated, sustained national reputation she has brought to her discipline, and comes with an annual research budget to continue her important work in social media platforms and online communities, education, and generative A.I.—especially from an ethics standpoint.

“She is able to break down those complicated problems in ways that help the public ask more thoughtful questions about the platforms and tools they use each day.”

Lori Bergen, founding dean

In fact, she’s created a public syllabus—consisting of her social media videos and select texts and other websites—to help others start thinking about the ethics of A.I. It’s still in beta, so to speak, but has attracted attention, including from teachers searching for relatable, approachable perspectives on these complex issues.

“Considering how much admiration and respect I have for everyone in the college, I’m beyond honored to be recognized,” Fiesler said.

The position comes with a small stipend, which Fiesler was interested in using to attract well-known speakers for guest talks—to expose students to great researchers—and to be able to pay student researchers for their contributions to her work, such as a grant-funded pilot project to create educational content on A.I. that’s delivered over social media.

“If that goes well, I’d like to be able to keep it going beyond the grant,” she said. “And if we were to do so, it would be important to make sure we’re fairly compensating our students for the work they do.”

Fiesler said she also attributes the successes of her research to collaborative work, particularly with the graduate students she’s worked with at the college. One of her former students, Shamika Klassen (PhDInfoSci’24), said having Fiesler for an advisor during her doctoral work “was like having a celebrity for a parent.”

“When I mention her name, people would say, ‘Oh, Professor Casey on TikTok,’ or ‘I watched her videos on YouTube when I was applying to graduate school,” said Klassen, now a user experience researcher at Google. “Casey is a testament to what public scholarship can be, in addition to being an incredible advisor and advocate of me and my work.”

More: Questions about A.I.? Let’s Chat

The endowed professorship was made possible through a donation from Joan Payden, a co-founder of the Payden & Rygel investment management firm, in memory of her brother, William Payden (Jour’57). Bill Payden was known for his curiosity, as he was a journalist, college professor, sports fan, cinephile, pianist, world traveler, and collector of aviation memorabilia and classic cars.

The family also created the Payden Faculty Excellence Award, which recognizes excellence in teaching and research or creative work, and the Payden Teaching Excellence Grants, which are awarded to faculty to support innovative teaching endeavors, such as new interdisciplinary courses, revamped classes that support enhanced student engagement, or to purchase resources or training to improve teaching and the student experience.

Joe Arney covers research and general news for the college.

Photographer Kimberly Coffin graduated from CMDI in 2018 with degrees in Media Production and Strategic Communication.

Casey Fiesler, whose perspectives on law and ethics in technology have given her national cachet, has been named the William R. Payden Endowed Professor at the college.

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Poll-arized

Anonymous — Fri, 16 Aug 2024 21:08:32 +0000

Poll-arized Anonymous (not verified) Fri, 08/16/2024 - 15:08

Joe Arney

Deepfakes. Distrust. Data manipulation. Is it any wonder American democracy feels like it has reached such a dangerous tipping point?

As our public squares have emptied of reasoned discussion, and our social media feeds have filled with vitriol, viciousness and villainy, we’ve found ourselves increasingly isolated and unable to escape our echo chambers. And while it’s easy to blame social media, adtech platforms or the news, it’s the way these forces overlap and feed off each other that’s put us in this mess.

It’s an important problem to confront as we close in on a consequential election, but the issue is bigger than just what happens this November, or whether you identify with one party or another. Fortunately, the College of Media, Communication and Information was designed for just these kinds of challenges, where a multidisciplinary approach is needed to frame, address and solve increasingly complex problems.

“Democracy is not just about what happens in this election,” said Nathan Schneider, an assistant professor of media studies and an expert in the design and governance of the internet. “It’s a much longer story, and through all the threats we’ve seen, I’ve taken hope from focusing my attention on advancing democracy, rather than just defending it.”

We spoke to Schneider and other CMCI experts in journalism, information science, media studies, advertising and communication to understand the scope of the challenges. And we asked one big question of each in order to help us make sense of this moment in history, understand how we got here and—maybe—find some faith in the future.

***

Newsrooms have been decimated. The younger generation doesn’t closely follow the news. Attention spans have withered in the TikTok age. Can we count on journalism to serve its Fourth Estate function and deliver fair, accurate coverage of the election?

Mike McDevitt, a former editorial writer and reporter, isn’t convinced the press has learned its lessons from the 2016 cycle, when outlets chased ratings and the appearance of impartiality over a commitment to craft that might have painted more accurate portraits of both candidates. High-quality reporting, he said, may mean less focus on finding scoops and more time sharing resources to chase impactful stories.

How can journalism be better?

“A lot of journalists might disagree with me, but I think news media should be less competitive among each other and find ways to collaborate, especially with the industry gutted. And the news can’t lose sight of what’s important by chasing clickable stories. Covering chaos and conflict is tempting, but journalism’s interests in this respect do not always align with the security of democracy. While threats to democracy are real, amplifying chaos is not how news media should operate during an era of democratic backsliding.”

***

After the 2016 election, Brian C. Keegan was searching for ways to use his interests in the computer and social sciences in service of democracy. That’s driven his expertise in public-interest data science—how to make closed data more accessible to voters, journalists, activists and researchers. He looks at how campaigns can more effectively engage voters, understand important issues and form policies that address community needs.

The U.S. news media has blood on its hands from 2016. It will go down as one of the worst moments in the history of American journalism.”

Mike McDevitt
Professor, journalism

You’ve called the 2012 election an “end of history” moment. Can you explain that in the context of what’s happening in 2024?

“In 2012, we were coming out of the Arab Spring, and everyone was optimistic about social media. The idea that it could be a tool for bots and state information operations to influence elections would have seemed like science fiction. Twelve years later, we’ve finally learned these platforms are not neutral, have real risk and can be manipulated. And now, two years into the large language model moment, people are saying these are just neutral tools that can only be a force for good. That argument is already falling apart.

I think 2024 will be the first, and last,
A.I. election.”

Brian C. Keegan
Assistant professor, information science

“You could actually roll the clock back even further, to the 1960s and ’70s, when people were thinking about Silent Spring and Unsafe at Any Speed, and recognizing there are all these environmental, regulatory, economic and social things all connected through this lens of the environment. Like any computing system, when it comes to data, if you have garbage in, you get garbage out. The bias and misinformation we put into these A.I. systems are polluting our information ecosystem in ways that journalists, activists, researchers and others aren’t equipped to handle.”

***

One of Angie Chuang’s last news jobs was covering race and ethnicity for The Oregonian. In the early 2000s, it wasn’t always easy to find answers to questions about race in a mostly white newsroom. Conferences like those put on by the Asian American Journalists Association “were times of revitalization for me,” she said.

When this year’s conference of the National Association of Black Journalists was disrupted by racist attacks against Kamala Harris, Chuang’s first thoughts were for the attendees who lost the opportunity to learn from one another and find the support she did as a cub reporter.

“What’s lost in this discussion is the entire event shifted to this focus on Donald Trump and the internal conflict in the organization, and I’m certain that as a result, journalists and students who went lost out on some of that solidarity,” she said. And it fits a larger pattern of outspoken newsmakers inserting themselves into the news to claim the spotlight.

How can journalism avoid being hijacked by the people it covers?

“It comes down to context. We need to train reporters to take a breath and not just focus on being the first out there. And I know that’s really hard, because the rewards for being first and getting those clicks ahead of the crowd are well established.”

“I can’t blame the reporters who feel these moments are worth covering, because I feel as conflicted as they do.
Angie Chuang
Associate professor, journalism

***

Agenda setting—the concept that we take our cues of what’s important from the news—is as old an idea as mass media itself, but Chris Vargo is drawing interesting conclusions from studying the practice in the digital age. Worth watching, he and other CMCI researchers said, are countermedia entities, which undermine the depictions of reality found in the mainstream press through hyper-partisan content and the use of mis- and disinformation.

How did we get into these silos, and how do we get out?

“The absence of traditional gatekeepers has helped people create identities around the issues they choose to believe in. Real-world cues do tell us a little about what we find important—a lot of people had to get COVID to know it was bad—but we now choose media in order to form a community. The ability to self-select what you want to listen to and believe in is a terrifying story, because selecting media based on what makes us feel most comfortable, that tells us what we want to hear, flies in the face of actual news reporting and journalistic integrity.”

“I do worry about our institutions. I don’t like that a majority of Americans don’t trust CNN.

Chris Vargo
Associate professor, advertising,
public relations and media design

***

Her research into deepfakes has validated what Sandra Ristovska has known for a long time: For as long as we’ve had visual technologies, we’ve had the ability to manipulate them.

Seeing pornographic images of Taylor Swift on social media or getting robocalls from Joe Biden telling voters to stay home—content created by generative artificial intelligence—is a reminder that the scale of the problem is unprecedented. But Ristovska’s work has found examples of fake photos from the dawn of the 20th century supposedly showing, for example, damage from catastrophic tornadoes that never happened.

Ristovska grew up amid the Yugoslav Wars; her interest in becoming a documentary filmmaker was in part shaped by seeing how photos and videos from the brutal fighting and genocide were manipulated for political and legal means. It taught her to be a skeptic when it comes to what she sees shared online.

“So, you see the Taylor Swift video—it seems out of character for her public persona. Or the president—why would he say something like that?” she said. “Instead of just hitting the share button, we should train ourselves to go online and fact check it—to be more engaged.”

Even when we believe something is fake, if it aligns with our worldview, we are likely to accept it as reality. Knowing that, how do we combat deepfakes?

“We need to go old school. We’ve lost sight of the collective good, and you solve that by building opportunities to come together as communities and have discussions. We’re gentler and more tolerant of each other when we’re face-to-face. This has always been true, but it’s becoming even more true today, because we have more incentives to be isolated than ever.”

***

Early scholarly works waxed poetic on the internet’s potential, through its ability to connect people and share information, to defeat autocracy. But, Nathan Schneider has argued, the internet is actually organized as a series of little autocracies—where users are subject to the whims of moderators and whoever owns the servers—effectively meaning you must work against the defaults to be truly democratic. He suggests living with these systems is contributing to the global rise of authoritarianism. In a new book, Governable Spaces, Schneider calls for redesigning social media with everyday democracy in mind.

If the internet enables autocracy, what can we do to fix it?

“We could design our networks for collective ownership, rather than the assumption that every service is a top-down fiefdom. And we could think about democracy as a tool for solving problems, like conflict among users. Polarizing outcomes, like so-called cancel culture, emerge because people don’t have better options for addressing harm. A democratic society needs public squares designed for democratic processes and practices.”

***

It may be derided as dull, but the public meeting is a bedrock of American democracy. It has also changed drastically as fringe groups have seized these spaces to give misinformation a megaphone, ban books and take up other undemocratic causes. Leah Sprain researches how specific communication practices facilitate and inhibit democratic action. She works as a facilitator with several groups, including the League of Women Voters and Restore the Balance, to ensure events like candidate forums embrace difficult issues while remaining nonpartisan.

What’s a story we’re not telling about voters ahead of the election?

“We should be looking more at college towns, because town-gown divides are real and long-standing. There’s a politics of resentment even in a place like Boulder, where you have people who say, ‘We know so much about these issues, we shouldn’t let students vote on them’—to the point where providing pizza to encourage voter turnout becomes this major controversy. Giving young people access to be involved, making them feel empowered to make a difference and be heard—these are good things.”

***

Toby Hopp studies the news media and digital content providers with an eye to how our interactions with media shape conversations in the public sphere. Much of that is changing as trust and engagement with mainstream news sources declines. He’s studied whether showing critical-thinking prompts alongside shared posts—requiring users to consider the messages as well as the structure of the platform itself—may be better than relying on top-down content moderation from tech companies.

Ultimately, the existing business model of the big social media companies—packaging users to be sold to advertisers—may be the most limiting feature when it comes to reform. Hopp said he doubts a business the size of Meta can pivot from its model.

How does social media rehabilitate itself to become more trusted? Can it?

“Social media platforms are driven by monopolistic impulses, and there’s not a lot of effort put into changing established strategies when you’re the only business in town. The development of new platforms might offer a wider breadth of platform choice—which might limit the spread of misinformation on a Facebook or Twitter due to the diminished reach of any single platform.”

***

Images have always required us to be more engaged. Now, with the speed of disinformation, we need to do a little more work.”

Sandra Ristovska
Assistant professor, media studies

CU News Corps was created to simulate a real-world newsroom that allows journalism students to do the kind of long-form, investigative pieces that are in such short supply at a time of social media hot takes and pundits trading talking points.

“I thought we should design the course you’d most want to take if you were a journalism major,” said Chuck Plunkett, director of the capstone course and an experienced reporter. Having a mandate to do investigative journalism “means we can challenge our students to dig in and do meaningful work, to expose them to other kinds of people or ideas that aren’t on their radar.”

Over the course of a semester, the students work under the guidance of reporters and editors at partner media companies to produce long-form multimedia stories that are shared on the News Corps website and, often, are picked up by those same publications, giving the students invaluable clips for their job searches while supporting resource-strapped newsrooms.

With the news business facing such a challenging future, both economically and politically, why should students study journalism?

“Even before the great contraction of news, the figure I had in my mind was five years after students graduate, maybe 25 percent of them were still in professional newsrooms. But journalism is a tremendous major because you learn to think critically, research deeply and efficiently, interact with other people, process enormous amounts of information, and have excellent communication skills. Every profession needs people with those skills.”

Joe Arney covers research and general news for the college.

Where do we go from here? CMCI experts share their perspectives on journalism, advertising, data science, communication and more in an era of democratic backsliding.

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