Dean and Alumni Distinguished Professor

Ph.D., American Studies, University of Kansas

B.A., Journalism and Mass Communication, Kansas State University
M.S., Journalism and Mass Communication, Kansas State University

Jean Folkerts is Dean and Alumni Distinguished Professor. She came to the School in 2006.

Prior to coming to Chapel Hill, she served in several roles at The George Washington University. These included being Director of the School of Media and Public Affairs, Professor of Honors, Associate Vice President for Special Academic Initiatives, and Interim Dean of Columbian College of Arts and Sciences.

In 2001, she was named Teacher of the Year by the Freedom Forum for excellence in the teaching of media history and she was named a Kansan of Distinction by the Topeka Capital-Journal for excellence in media and journalism. From 1992 to 2001, she was editor of Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly. Her book, Voices of a Nation, written with Dwight Teeter, chronicles the history of U.S. media. A second book, now in the third edition, Media in Your Life, (with Stephen Lacy) is an account of contemporary mass media. She serves on the editorial boards of Journal of Communication and Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly.

Folkerts’ professional experience includes work as a daily newspaper reporter, a public relations professional and magazine editor for The Menninger Foundation, free-lance magazine article writer, and as assistant press secretary to a former governor of Kansas.

Folkerts was Director of Student Publications at Washburn University in Topeka, Kansas; she taught at the University of Texas at Austin and was an Associate Professor and Director of the Department of Communications at Mount Vernon College before moving to GWU in 1990.

Folkerts has served on the editorial boards of Journalism Monographs and Journalism History. She was a member of the Professional Freedom and Responsibility Committee of the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication (AEJMC) in 1991 and also served as newsletter editor, research chair and head of the History Division. She was on the executive board of the Association of Schools of Journalism and Mass Communication from 1998-2001.

Office phone: (919) 962-1204
Office location: Carroll 120
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