College Launches Media Site: PSUComMedia.com

The College of of Communications’ new student media website, psucommedia.com, has been launched, effective Feb. 1.

The site was built to provide a public platform for the professional-quality content produced by students in the College of Communications.

“Our students have exceeded all expectations with their coverage of major events like the 10th anniversary of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, the criminal charges filed against Jerry Sandusky and the death of Joe Paterno,” said Thor Wasbotten, assistant dean for student media and online operations. “All of their coverage can be found at psucommedia.com online.”

The site contains:

• News and sports coverage from throughout Centre County.
• Centre County Report: A weekly newscast that serves as a source of news and information to the residents of Centre County and functions as a real-time laboratory for students learning to report and deliver news to an on-air (ComMedia HD 98.1 on campus) and online audience.
• ComRadio: The official radio station of the College of Communications. More than 200 students, specializing in news, sports, production, marketing/promotion and sales, staff the Internet-based station. These students produce half-hour newscasts that air at 6 p.m. every weekday, provide play-by-play of many Penn State and State College high school sporting events and are responsible for creating and airing talk shows each week.
• Special Coverage: Content produced by team of students covering events in Centre County and all over the world.

ComMedia is a 24/7 newsroom and multimedia production facility used by the best students in the College of Communications to prepare them for professional media-related careers.

It houses a state-of-the-art, high-definition television set for news and sports productions as well as a complete suite of equipment for video editing and encoding, photo editing, audio recording and video playback and capture in the TV studio control room. Content produced by students is broadcast locally, distributed over an HD campus channel and delivered via psucommedia.com online.

Alum Author Scores with Latest Book, 'Paydirt'

Author Paul Levine ('69 Journ) has been a lifelong football fan -- first following the New York Giants, then Penn State while he was in college and later the Miami Dolphins during his career as lawyer in Miami.

He's also a talented author -- producing award winning novels as part of the Jake Lassiter Series and the Solomon vs. Lord Series, and many others.

His latest work, "Paydirt," provides a perfect combination of his love of football and his writing skills.

Here's the setup:

Bobby Gallagher has it all ... and loses it.

Now, to reclaim his life ...

All he has to do -- with the help of his brainiac 12-year-old son -- is rig the Super Bowl, win a huge bet ... and avoid getting killed.

The book is available as a Kindle e-book, priced for a short time at $2.99, and as a trade paperback ($12.25).

For more information and to sample or purchase "Paydirt" visit ...

• Paul Levine's website; or

• Amazon.com online.

ComMedia Continues Complete Coverage

College of Communications students continue to provide complete coverage of the passing of former Penn State football coach Joe Paterno.

ComMedia

With photo galleries, stories and video, student journalists covered "A Memorial for Joe" from many angles. Additional work will be showcased on the "Centre County Report," which airs on Campus Cable, WPSU-TV and online.

The memorial service itself, conducted Thursday, Jan. 26, at the Bryce Jordan Center on campus, also featured many communications-related alumni. Speakers included a representative player from each decade during Paterno's coaching career. Among the speakers were three members of the advisory board for the John Curley Center for Sports Journalism -- Charlie Pittman (1960s), Jimmy Cefalo (1970s) and Todd Blackledge (1980s) -- and Michael Robinson (2000s), who earned two degrees from the College of Communications.

Several media outlets -- including GoPSUSports.com (with the Big Ten Network coverage) -- have much of the memorial service available for online viewing and WTAJ-TV is selling DVDs of its coverage with all proceeds to benefit the Penn State Dance Marathon.

BTN to Air 'A Memorial for Joe' Live, Online

The Big Ten Network will provide live coverage on TV and online of "A Memorial for Joe" at 2 p.m. Thursday. LINK HERE

The memorial service at the Bryce Jordan Center is expected to draw a capacity crowd to the Bryce Jordan Center on campus. Tickets for the event were made available online Monday, and they were all distributed in minutes.

Along with BTN, the service will be televised live by WJAC-TV (Channel 6) in Altoona/Johnstown, WTAJ-TV (Channel 10) in Altoona/State College and on ESPN Radio 1450 in State College.

Players from every decade of Paterno's career are scheduled to speak at the event -- among them Jimmy Cefalo (1970s, a College of Communications alumnus and member of the advisory board for the John Curley Center for Sports Journalism). Sixteeen members of the Penn State Glee Club were selected to sing the alma mater at the service.

After all of the other speakers has finished, Jay Paterno will eulogize his father.

Alumni, Students Provide Paterno Perspectives

With the death of legendary Penn State football coach Joe Paterno on Sunday, Jan. 22, 2012, reaction and support have poured in from across the country -- from every conceivable corner. That includes Penn State alumni, coaching colleagues, former student-athletes, media members and many more.

A sampling of some of those reactions from College of Communications alumni, faculty, friends and students includes:

• Knight Chair Malcolm Moran, director of the John Curley Center for Sports Journalism, writes "Paterno lived and died with football" for the Philadelphia Inquirer;

• ongoing, updated coverage by students on ComMedia;

• commentary and video from Duke men's basketball coach Mike Krzyzewski, who was part of a made-for-TV program sponsored by the Curley Center last June;

• a column by alumnus Bob McKinnon ('90 Adv/PR) about the final judgment of Paterno; and

• a report about the coach's death by Mike Poorman ('82 Journ), director of alumni relations for the college, on StateCollege.com.

Alumni Roll Out Red Carpet for THON in L.A.

Alumni and friends of Penn State living in Southern California plan to roll out the red carpet for the Penn State IFC/Panhellenic Dance Marathon with a special event in January.

With a Mini-THON, celebrity appearances and silent auction at the historic Avalon Hollywood on Jan. 29, organizers hope the event -- dubbed "Lights. Camera. Cure." will drive even more support for the Four Diamonds Fund, Dance Marathon and the fight against pediatric cancer.

"We had a small gathering last year to raise money for THON and we wanted to do something bigger this year," said Erica Wernick, a Penn Stater who serves as co-chair of the event with Gary Werkheiser, a 1981 Penn State graduate with a degree in accounting. "We came up with the idea to do a Mini-THON, Hollywood style because we wanted a fun, exciting event."

Participants will be dancing for six hours at the Avalon Hollywood, which was the site of the Beatles' first performance on the West Coast in 1964. During the club's rich history it has served as the site of Merv Griffin's talk show and performances by the Rolling Stones, Prince Tina Turner, Nine Inch Nails and many other legendary groups and musicians during the past four decades.

Information about the event supported by the Los Angeles Chapter of the Penn State Alumni Association may be found at www.lightscameracure.com online. Organizers -- a group that includes many who danced or helped with THON as undergraduates -- hope to attract as many as 100 dancers and 500 guests for the event.

THON, the largest student-run philanthropy in the world, is a yearlong effort to raise funds ans awareness for the fight against pediatric cancer. Since 1977, THON has raised more than $78 million for The Four Diamonds Fund at Penn State Hershey Children's Hospital.

THON 2012 will take place Feb. 17-19 in the Bryce Jordan Center on the University Park campus. For more information, visit www.THON.org online.

ComRadio Students Conduct Q&A with Washington Post's Sally Jenkins About Paterno

A pair of proactive reporters for ComRadio scored an interview with Sally Jenkins of the Washington Post minutes before her story about Joe Paterno (the first public comments by the former Penn State football coach) went public this past weekend.

LISTEN HERE

The reporters, Will Jungels and Patrick Woo, conducted a thoughtful and thorough Q&A during 15 minutes with Jenkins.

The discussion started with questions about how she secured the interview, and touched on a range of topics, including Paterno's, his relationship with Jerry Sandusky, his thoughts about the University, the hiring of Bill O'Brien as his success and a number of related topics.

ComRadio is the Internet-based, student-directed radio station operated by the College of Communications.