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| Forum role | Member since | Last activity | Topics created | Replies created |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Member | Oct 11, 2011 (14 years) |
- | 0 | 4 |
- Forum role
- Member
- Member since
Oct 11, 2011 (14 years)
- Last activity
- -
- Topics created
- 0
- Replies created
- 4
Bio
I have been an award-winning Ontario rural and suburban community newspaper journalist, editor, publisher, general manager and a journalism teacher, for 40 years. I began my newspaper career in May 1978 when, after graduating from journalism school, landed a job as a reporter/photographer at the Haliburton (Ont.) County Echo. I've worked since then as a reporter, photographer, managing editor, publisher and general manager for small town and suburban community newspapers in Fort Erie (Times-Review), Peterborough (Review), Arnprior (Chronicle), Almonte (Gazette), Glengarry County (News) and up until August 2000, was publisher/managing editor of a group of community newspapers in rural and suburban south Ottawa with my wife Diane.
Between 1989 and 1995, I sat on the Ontario Community Newspapers Association (OCNA) Board of Directors and served as the organization’s second vice president in 1993 and 1994. In the course of my career, I have been recognized with several awards for my work as a community journalist, including as a three-time winner of the Bell Canada Award for column writing, the Ontario Ministry of Environment Environmental Writing Award, and the Ontario Hydro Feature Writing Award. In addition, the newspapers I've managed have won record numbers of awards in their class for journalism, design, photography and commentary. In March 2000, my career in the community newspaper industry was honoured when I was named by OCNA as one of 50 industry individuals who has made a major contribution to Ontario’s community newspaper industry since OCNA’s founding in 1950. In 2005, I published ‘The Osgoode Village Story’, a local history book which has sold 1,400 copies, with all revenues being donated to the local community association to be earmarked for local improvement. I was interviewed by the CBC about the book: http://www.cbc.ca/player/play/1205089347633
Since 2000, I have been employed as a full-time Journalism professor/coordinator at the Algonquin College of Applied Arts and Technology’s Media Centre. I annually judge newspaper excellence competitions for the Canadian Association of Journalists and the Ontario Community Newspapers Association. I regularly lead seminars for the Alberta Weekly Newspapers Association, and have been a regular presence at OCNA sessions. In May 2018, I sat on a Canadian Association of Journalists panel at its annual conference to discuss the future of journalism education. I have been the treasurer and past present of the Ontario Journalism Educators Association since 2002.
In addition to my teaching duties at Algonquin, I wrote a freelance column for the daily Ottawa Citizen which focused on life in the city’s rural fringes. I was the volunteer director of www.gojournalism.ca, a non-profit, community-funded journalism site that closed in 2015. In 2013, I was named a finalist and runner-up in the Capital Educators Awards program, post-secondary level.
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