Advisory Board Members Visit Elon; Gifts Announced

Twenty media professionals came to Elon's campus Oct. 4-5, 2001, as members and guests of the School of Communications Advisory Board. They came from CNN and Disney, from ABC and USA Today, from North Carolina newspapers and broadcast stations. Advisory Board members visited with students and faculty about the school's curriculum, offered constructive suggestions regarding long-term planning and fund-raising, offered one-to-one advice to students regarding jobs and internships and spoke to large groups in classes about ethical dilemmas they recently have faced on the job.

At the board's opening luncheon, Elon President Leo M. Lambert announced that the Hearst Foundation has awarded a $100,000 endowment to Elon to fund scholarships for under-represented students. The gift came through the work of Advisory Board member Jim Hefner of Pittsburgh, Pa.

Elon's School of Communications also has received a $12,500 matching grant to fund a "video oral history series" recording the autobiographical accounts of journalists who covered the civil rights movement in North Carolina. The grant, from a foundation that wishes to remain anonymous, is a direct result of a conversation Associate Dean Brad Hamm and Advisory Board member Fred Barber of Raleigh had at the very first board dinner. Hamm will coordinate the video oral history series.