Drake seniors Katrina Sletten and Ellen Converse have been named finalists for the national PR News People Awards. Sletten is a finalist for PR Student of the Year and Converse is nominated for Intern of the Year.

The winners will be named at the annual PR People Awards Luncheon on Dec. 4 at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C. The event celebrates the top professionals in public relations. This makes three years in a row an SJMC public relations student has been named a finalist in each category.

Sletten is finishing her work as a triple public relations, astronomy and physics major. She spent the summer in the Brooke Owens Fellowship program as an intern with the Museum of Flight in Seattle in the Digital Learning Department.

Converse, a PR and history major, had a summer internship in D.C. as education outreach coordinator at the Newseum. She has also had internships at AARP and the Stuhr Museum of the Prairie Pioneer in Grand Island, Neb.

Kathleen Richardson, SJMC

Drake Magazine has received the top award in college journalism, winning a national Pacemaker honor at the recent Associated Collegiate Press and College Media Association convention in Louisville, Ky.

Urban Plains, the multimedia website produced by Drake School of Journalism and Mass Communication seniors, also won Associated Collegiate Press awards:

• Second place, multimedia feature: Urban Plains, Katherine Bauer, Genna Clemen and Jess Lynk
• Fifth place, multimedia sports: Urban Plains, Matthew Gogerty and Adam Rogan

In the College Media Association competition, Drake won four Pinnacle awards:

• Best Magazine Contents Page/Spread: First Place, Drake Magazine
• Best Online Main Page: Second Place, Urban Plains
• Best Portrait: Second Place, Urban Plains
• Best Arts and Entertainment Story: Third Place, Urban Plains

Kathleen Richardson, SJMC

Carol Spaulding-Kruse, professor of English, was recognized as a finalist for Campus Compact’s 2018 Thomas Ehrlich Civically Engaged Faculty Award. The award is bestowed annually to recognize one faculty member and up to four finalists nationally for exemplary leadership in advancing student civic learning, conducting community-based research, fostering reciprocal partnerships, building institutional commitments to engagement, and enhancing higher education’s contributions to the public good. Congratulations to Professor Spaulding-Kruse and two of the programs highlighted in her application, the Drake Community Press and Writing Internship program.

Renee Sedlacek, director of community-engaged learning

Dr. Laura Kieran and Dr. Sally Haack published PRELOAD: A Rubric to Evaluate Course Syllabi for Quality Indicators of Community Engagement and Service-Learning components. PRELOAD is one of the only comprehensive rubrics created to assess service-learning syllabi. Congratulations to Dr. Kieran and Dr. Haack on the contributions they are making to the field of service-learning and community engagement.  View the rubric here.

Kieran, L. & Haack, S. (2018). PRELOAD: A rubric to evaluate course syllabi for quality indicators of community engagement and service-learning components. Journal of Community Engagement in Higher Education, 10(2), 39-47.

Renee Sedlacek, Director of Community-Engaged Learning

Chris Ditter, Associate Director of Student Financial Planning, was recently awarded the State Leadership Award for Iowa at the annual conference of the Midwest Association of Student Financial Aid Administrators (MASFAA) in Minneapolis, MN.

The State Leadership Award is presented annually to recognize the outstanding leadership of a member from each of the 9 states within MASFAA. The recipients must have made outstanding contributions to the financial aid profession at the state and regional levels over a sustained period of time, i.e., seven years or more. Leadership at the regional level is not the only criterion for this award, and the selection process will not be limited to current state elected leaders.

The individuals selected for this award must: exhibit high integrity and character; have shown creative leadership; have inspired and encouraged others to participate actively in professional development activities; have sustained active involvement in professional organizations, and have supported the goals and objectives of MASFAA.

Chris has been involved with the Iowa Association of Student Financial Aid Administrators (IASFAA) for many years, having served as President for 2016-17, co-chairs the Electronic Services committee, and previously served as Treasurer and chaired the Exhibitor Relations committee. She also just finished serving on the MASFAA Board as the State Representative for Iowa this previous year.

Kristi Fuller, Student Financial Planning

Weeks after being named one of the Midwest’s best universities according to U.S. News and World Report’s 2019 Best Colleges rankings, Drake University is pleased to announce recognition on another distinctive list.

According to results reported by the National Association of State Boards of Accountancy, Drake, a fully accredited AACSB business school, ranked 14th out of nearly 800 institutions in the nation for its pass rate on the 2017 Certified Public Accountant (CPA) exam. The University’s accounting graduates, taking the CPA exam for the first time, recorded an average pass rate of nearly 80 percent, well above the national average of approximately 53 percent.

Read the full news release.

Students from Drake’s chapter of the Public Relations Student Society of America (PRSSA) were invited to present at the international PRSSA conference in Austin, Texas, Oct. 7–9. The student conference is held in conjunction with the annual professional public relations conference.

Seniors Karoline Sandusky, Emma Haselhuhn, Meghan Kearney and Ellen Converse, and junior Ben Heinze presented on “Fundraising and Financial Education.” Only a handful of PRSSA chapters among the 300 international chapters are invited to present at the conference every year, and Drake students have been invited in four of the past five years.

Kathleen Richardson, SJMC

Experienced fundraiser Matt Lyons has joined the Drake University athletics staff and will serve as senior associate athletics director for external affairs, Drake director of athletics Brian Hardin announced Thursday.

Lyons will serve as the primary fundraiser for the athletics department and will oversee the efforts of Drake’s advancement, communications, marketing, and ticket sales departments.

“We are quite fortunate to have someone with Matt’s experience and background join our team at Drake,” athletics director Brian Hardin said.  “Matt’s history of successful revenue generation and familiarity with the Missouri Valley Conference will have a tremendous impact on our student-athletes, coaches and staff.  We are thrilled to welcome Matt and his wife LB to the Drake family.”

Prior to moving to Des Moines, Lyons worked at Illinois State since 2011, initially as the assistant athletics director for development, and since 2016 as the associate athletics director for development.  While with the Redbirds, Lyons served as the lead fundraiser and revenue generator for Illinois State athletics.

Lyons directed efforts for all aspects of Illinois State’s revenue generation unit, including major gifts, annual giving, endowments, outbound ticket sales, hospitality sales, letterwinners association, and special events.  He also served as the liaison with Redbird Sports Properties, the multi-media rights holder for Illinois State athletics.

Under the leadership of Lyons, Illinois State athletics exceeded a $25,000,000 fundraising goal during a campus-wide campaign and Lyons was personally responsible for more than $19,000,000 in gift commitments.

Prior to Illinois State, Lyons was the director of the Panther Scholarship Club at the University of Northern Iowa from 2010-11.  Lyons was a member of the athletics director leadership team and was the lead fundraiser for UNI’s annual giving program to athletics.

Lyons began his career as the assistant director of development at the University of Missouri from 2007-08 before moving to Illinois State from 2008-2010 where he earned his Master’s degree as a graduate assistant in the athletics development department.

Lyons earned his bachelor’s degree from the University of Illinois.

Also on Thursday, Hardin announced title promotions for four members of the athletics department senior staff.  Blake Boldon, Megan Franklin and Patrick Tomka were all promoted from associate athletics directors to senior associate athletics directors.  Boldon will continue to direct the Drake Relays and Franklin will continue serving as the senior woman administrator.  Tomka assumes the role of senior associate athletics director for finance and operations.  He will have direct oversight of the athletics department’s business office, as well as the facilities, operations, and equipment units.  Stephanie Sledge was promoted to associate athletics director for student-athlete academic success services.

Megan Franklin, Athletics

Drake students were honored recently for their achievements in public relations, writing and publication.

Work created by public relations seniors won three PRIME awards from the Public Relations Society of America Central Iowa Chapter. The 2018 senior capstone class created campaigns for Creative Visions, a Des Moines nonprofit organization that supports vulnerable communities through education and economic empowerment. The student teams won two PRIME awards in the Student Campaign category and a Community Champion award in the professional contest. The awards will be presented at central Iowa PRSA’s annual conference on Thursday, Oct. 18.

SJMC students won seven magazine and writing awards at the recent Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication contest.

Urban Plains, the website produced by the Magazine Media, News and Digital Media Production seniors, placed second in the Online Magazine category. The judge said of Urban Plains, “More than ever before, we need national stories with a Midwestern prism — stories that forever alter the perception of this part of the country and the people who live here.”

Multimedia stories produced for Urban Plains won first-place awards in the Investigation and Analysis and First Person categories; second place and honorable mention in the Places category, and honorable mention in the Features category. The judges in the Investigation and Analysis category said of the Drake student work, “Attempting to incorporate audio, video, maps, and other multimedia elements can often make a piece feel cumbersome and gimmicky. But the journalists were able to use all these tools to tell a more immersive and fleshed-out story. . . . I’d love to see what the reporters could pull off if they had even more resources.”

The SJMC winners were:

Online Magazine: Second place, Urban Plains
Articles — First Person: First place, “New Kid in the Ring,” Adam Rogan
Articles — Investigation and Analysis: First place, “From a Drop of Hate to a Ripple of Healing,” Jess Lynk, Katherine Bauer
Articles — Places: Second place, “Zombie Balls,” Matthew Gogerty; honorable mention, “Exploring the Abandoned Midwest,” Anne Matte
Articles — Features: Honorable mention, “500 Miles on 500 Dollars,” Adam Rogan
New Magazine Ideas: Second place, “Breakthrough,” Kayla Parker

Kathleen Richardson, School of Journalism and Mass Communication