JMC Takes a New Turn in Fall 2013




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  • 2013-04-24 14:24:00
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Melody Gilbert will be the new chair of the Journalism and Mass Communications department at AUBG starting form July 2013. The news came out on April 18 at the JMC Rocks 10th anniversary cocktail party, when the current department chair Professor Dinka Spirovska expressed her satisfaction with the work done up until now and her gratitude to everyone in JMC. She then announced that she will be stepping down from the position pretty soon. [caption id="attachment_14643" align="alignleft" width="285" caption="Dinka Spirovska, courtesy of Igor Myakotin"][/caption] Gilbert is an Assistant Professor of Journalism and Mass Communication and probably the most famous documentary movie maker on campus. She came to AUBG in 2011 with the initial idea to fulfill only her 3-year contract but fell in love with the university ever since. “Professor Wollemann [Gilbert's husband] and I want to stay and are committed to serving you guys, because you deserve it,” Gilbert said. Professor Spirovska is taking a well-deserved break from all the administrative and organizational work that is tied to being a department chair, after serving as one for 5 consecutive years. The practice at AUBG is that chairs rotate every 2 years. However, Spirovska remained in her position in order to stay consistent with her work with the Bulgarian Accreditation Commission for the JMC degree at AUBG, as well as to keep the department together during the professor turnover that took place during the past several years. “I am proud of keeping the department stable and moving it forward. My predecessor Professor [Aernout] van Lynden had a huge following and when he left students thought the program will dissolve for whatever reason. That, of course never happened,” Spirovska said. She defined the switch between Gilbert and her as a “healthy rotation” and expressed her certainty that the department can only develop from here on, since the last 5 years have given Gilbert a strong foundation to step on. Melody Gilbert and Dinka Spirovska at JMC Rocks, courtesy of Igor MyakotinThe news are still fresh for Professor Gilbert herself, who found out about her new position shortly before the JMC Rocks event, so she was almost as surprised as everybody present at the event. “I have nothing specific planned yet because I still need some time to process, but I have two or three things than I have been thinking about,” she said. Gilbert is considering establishing a Film minor at AUBG in the light of all the work going on in video production classes at AUBG. “There’s so much interest in film and video here and everything is actually in place to make it happen, it is just a matter of making it happen,” she said. Keeping the department fresh and moving is one of Gilbert’s major ideas for the upcoming academic year:  “I feel like we are on a roll, we’re doing really cool things – the Daily, the Doc club and all the people that are doing video and film, and Multimedia Journalism […] I want people to be excited about their major and not to feel like it’s a secondary thing. It’s exciting to be in JMC.” New professor recruitment,  will be one of Gilbert’s most important concerns next year as there is again some movement within JMC faculty. “We’ll look for people, who want to come here, who are excited about being in this awesome school, this environment. It really takes some unique people, and we’ll find them,” Gilbert said. What Spirovska is hoping Gilbert will bring to the department is “energy, her dynamism, her spirit, the [caption id="attachment_14645" align="alignright" width="285" caption="JMCers anticipating the announcement"][/caption] way she motivates students.” In the meantime Spirovska will be able to focus more on her classes: “I will be getting back to being more creative and to teaching. I want to update many things in my courses and all that takes time. I am looking forward to that. And spending more time working with students, actually this is what I miss, the personal attention that I haven’t always been able to give, especially the last couple of years.” In Fall 2013 JMC students will be asked to participate in polls regarding the changes they want to see in the department as suggested by Gilbert. What faculty is planning to focus on is positioning JMC as a competitive major. “Be careful, we’re out there, we’re up and coming,” Gilbert joked.  As she explained, she merely wanted to remind all the JMC-ers that they should be proud of what they do and keep their good work coming.