Gateway Media Literacy Week

By Emily Fisher
On October 31, Blackburn communications professor Natasha Casey, took a group nine students
to St. Louis for events held as part of Gateway Media Literacy week. The first session students
attended was at Webster University and presented speakers from the St. Louis Post Dispatch and
consisted of the Missouri and national elections. The discussion revolved around how the media
covers elections. After the first session was over, the group headed to KWMU, St. Louiss Public
Radio station, in which they took a tour and learned about the radio side of the communication
business from long-time employee Mary Edwards, production manager, talk show producer, and
St. Louis symphony producer. While there, they got to listen to Claire McCaskill, the Democratic
Missouri U.S. Senate candidate. Next was a trip to Lindenwood University, to attend another
panel presentation featuring professors from that university, which centered around media
technology. The speakers were professors of Lindenwood University which centered around
media technology. In order for us to become more media literate (our relationship with the
media), we as humans must be able to admit the influence that technology has on us each day.
After the conference, they headed to left Bank Books, an independent bookstore in St. Louis, to
hear Amy Goodman speak. Amy Goodman is the host of Democracy Now!, which is a national,
independent, award-winning news program based out of New York City. According to the
website of Democracy Now!, Goodman is the first journalist to receive the Right Livelihood
Award. She recently published a book with Denis Moyhihan, called The Silenced Majority:
Stories of Uprisings, Occupations, Resistance, and Hope. After listening to Goodman speak, the
group headed over to Mango, a local Peruvian restaurant. The students were encouraged to
branch out of their comfort zones and experience new things. Haley Welch, a Communications
major, states: The field trip made me more excited about my future career because I was able to
hear actual journalists discuss what they do on a daily basis and I was able to see exactly what is
in store for me in the future. Amanda Johnston, a Communications senior, states: It was
exciting to see what I could do with my degree. I realized I could apply what Im learning in
school to understand and contribute to contemporary debates about media literacy.