Dept. of Communications Studies Announces Advisory Board

The Com­mu­ni­ca­tion Stud­ies Advi­sory Coun­cil is a team of dis­tin­guished lead­ers, edu­ca­tors and Texas State alumni who join with the fac­ulty of the Depart­ment of Com­mu­ni­ca­tion Stud­ies to main­tain and fur­ther enhance the Depart­ment of Com­mu­ni­ca­tion Stud­ies at Texas State University-San Marcos.

The Com­mu­ni­ca­tion Stud­ies Advi­sory Coun­cil is a team of dis­tin­guished lead­ers, edu­ca­tors and Texas State alumni who join with the fac­ulty of the Depart­ment of Com­mu­ni­ca­tion Stud­ies to main­tain and fur­ther enhance the Depart­ment of Com­mu­ni­ca­tion Stud­ies at Texas State University-San Marcos.

The Depart­ment of Com­mu­ni­ca­tion Stud­ies Advi­sory Coun­cil con­venes twice each year on the cam­pus to meet with fac­ulty, stu­dents, and admin­is­tra­tors to pro­vide guid­ance and sup­port to the depart­ment. Coun­cil mem­bers assist in the place­ment of grad­u­ates and interns, serve as guest speak­ers for classes, iden­tify finan­cial and other resources to meet depart­ment needs, and pro­vide gen­eral coun­sel to enhance the department’s research, teach­ing, and ser­vice goals.

The Depart­ment of Com­mu­ni­ca­tion Stud­ies is a vibrant com­mu­ni­ca­tion depart­ment that includes more than 500 majors and minors. Stu­dents take courses in orga­ni­za­tional com­mu­ni­ca­tion, rhetoric and pub­lic address, inter­per­sonal and small group com­mu­ni­ca­tion, com­mu­ni­ca­tion the­ory, and instruc­tional com­mu­ni­ca­tion. The Depart­ment of Com­mu­ni­ca­tion Stud­ies grad­u­ate pro­gram has been rated as one of the top Mas­ter of Arts degree pro­grams in the United States.  Fif­teen fac­ulty mem­bers are active in state, regional, and national asso­ci­a­tions and pub­lish widely in pro­fes­sional journals.  Texas State University-San Mar­cos indi­vid­ual events stu­dents rank among the top pro­grams in the nation.  The debate team is an award-winning, con­sis­tently highly ranked team.

ADVISORY COUNCIL MEMBERS

Dr. Jim Antenen

Dr. Ante­nen is Dean of Way­land Bap­tist Uni­ver­sity, San Anto­nio. Pre­vi­ously he was USAA Man­age­ment Devel­op­ment Con­sul­tant. Dr. Ante­nen served as Com­mu­nity Col­lege Pres­i­dent of the Air Force. He received his Ed.D. from Auburn Uni­ver­sity and has pub­lished numer­ous orga­ni­za­tional man­age­ment, lead­er­ship, and adult edu­ca­tion articles.

Dr. Jef­frey S. Austin

Dr. Austin over­sees Peo­pleW­erks, a group devoted to the well-being of The Scooter Store. Pre­vi­ously he worked for two inter­na­tional con­sult­ing orga­ni­za­tions on lead­er­ship and orga­ni­za­tion. Dr. Austin was a fac­ulty mem­ber at the Air Force Acad­emy for 12 years and Assis­tant Vice Pres­i­dent for Lead­er­ship and Orga­ni­za­tional Devel­op­ment at USAA.

Ms. Paula Fisher

Ms. Fisher is project coor­di­na­tor for the Uni­ver­sity of Texas Inter­scholas­tic League Aca­d­e­mic Pro­gram. She has served as grant direc­tor and adjunct pro­fes­sor at Texas State. At Hays High School she was aca­d­e­mic dean and teacher. Ms. Fisher is a for­mer National Out­stand­ing Speech Edu­ca­tor and author of the 1989–90 national high school debate topic.

Ms. Nicki Harle

Ms. Harle serves as the exec­u­tive direc­tor of Texas Mid­west Com­mu­nity Net­work, a coali­tion of com­mu­ni­ties and coun­ties work­ing together to recruit busi­ness in mid­west Texas. She also serves on the Exec­u­tive Com­mit­tee of the state agency Office of Rural Com­mu­nity Affairs. She is a 1971 grad­u­ate of Texas State University.

Dr. A. J. Josefowitz

Dr. Jose­fowitz is the Human Resources Devel­op­ment Man­ager for 3M in Austin, Texas. He is also the core design team mem­ber of 3M’s Lead­er­ship Devel­op­ment Insti­tute located in St. Paul, Min­nesota and has worked for 3M for the past 19 years. Dr. Jose­fowitz earned a Ph.D. in Edu­ca­tional Psy­chol­ogy from the Uni­ver­sity of Minnesota.

Ms. Carol Kerr

Ms. Kerr, owner of Kerr & Asso­ciates, has been both an inter­nal and inde­pen­dent con­sul­tant since receiv­ing her M.A. in Com­mu­ni­ca­tion Stud­ies from Texas State and is widely rec­og­nized for her cus­tomer focus. She co-authored Cus­tomer Rela­tion­ship Man­age­ment pub­lished by McGraw-Hill and is now using her cus­tomer rela­tion­ship mange­ment and nego­ti­a­tion skills to build a sec­ond busi­ness as a real­tor in Austin, Texas.

Mr. Vick Meredith

Mr. Mered­ith is pres­i­dent of Biz­Doc. He was pre­vi­ously rec­og­nized as one of San Antonio’s “Forty Under Forty” most suc­cess­ful busi­ness exec­u­tives. Vick speaks fre­quently to busi­ness groups con­cern­ing effec­tive and per­sua­sive com­mu­ni­ca­tion. He has a B.A. and M.A. in Com­mu­ni­ca­tion Stud­ies from Texas State and has received the Out­stand­ing Com­mu­ni­ca­tion Stud­ies Alumni of the Year Award.

The Hon­or­able Eliz­a­beth Nash

Ms. Nash is a for­mer mem­ber and chair of the Board of Regents of the Texas State Uni­ver­sity Sys­tem (the gov­ern­ing body which over­sees Texas State University-San Mar­cos) and cur­rently serves on their foun­da­tion. She has chaired the Texas State Devel­op­ment Foun­da­tion and is active in numer­ous com­mu­nity activ­i­ties and orga­ni­za­tions includ­ing the Wells Fargo Bank Advi­sory Board and the Board of KLRU (pub­lic television).

Dr. Dar­rell Piersol

An inter­na­tion­ally known speaker and lec­turer, Dr. Pier­sol is past Direc­tor of the State of Texas Governor’s Exec­u­tive Devel­op­ment Pro­gram. He is Dis­tin­guished Pro­fes­sor of Man­age­ment at Texas State Uni­ver­sity. He earned a Ph.D. in Speech Com­mu­ni­ca­tion from Pur­due Uni­ver­sity. He is past pres­i­dent of the Inter­na­tional Com­mu­ni­ca­tion Asso­ci­a­tion and worked for IBM for 26 years. He also serves on the Advi­sory Board of Wells Fargo Bank.

Dr. Den­nis Romig

Den­nis A. Romig, Ph.D. is the CEO of Side by Side, Inc., a human behav­ioral sci­ence “Think and Do Tank.” The cur­rent mis­sion is to facil­i­tate suc­cess­ful merg­ers, alliances, and part­ner­ing. Side by Side clients include IBM, Texas Instru­ments, Shell, Sam­sung, and Dell. Dr. Romig is the author of Side by Side Lead­er­ship, a New York times Bestseller.

Ms. Lau­rie Romig

Ms. Romig is Vice Pres­i­dent of Cur­ricu­lum Devel­op­ment for Side by Side, Inc., a con­sult­ing and train­ing firm in Austin, Texas. She has  devel­oped more than 200 train­ing pro­grams in the diverse fields of team­work, lead­er­ship, orga­ni­za­tional devel­op­ment, part­ner­ing, heal­ing, and rec­on­cil­i­a­tion. She has trained lead­ers internationally.

Dr. Ken­neth Teufel

Dr. Teufel received his M.D. from The Uni­ver­sity of Texas Med­ical Branch, Galve­ston, and his master’s degree in Inter­cul­tural Rela­tions through the Inter­cul­tural Com­mu­ni­ca­tion Insti­tute. Dr. Teufel worked in South­east Asia prior to his pri­vate prac­tice in New Braun­fels, Texas. He has also taught Health Com­mu­ni­ca­tion at Texas State

Ms. Nina Vaca-Humrichouse

Ms. Vaca-Humrichouse is founder and CEO of Texas Pin­na­cle, a lead­ing national provider of cus­tom IT solu­tions. She is the first two-time win­ner of the U.S. His­panic Cham­ber of Commerce’s pres­ti­gious busi­ness Woman of the Year Award, and has been named one of the Top 25 Women Busi­ness Builders in the coun­try. She was hon­ored with the Texas State Depart­ment of Com­mu­ni­ca­tion Stud­ies 2006 Dis­tin­guished Alumni Award.

Mr. Ben Wehman

Mr. Wehman is cur­rently employed as a per­son­nel man­age­ment and safety train­ing con­sul­tant at Pri­or­ity Per­son­nel, San Mar­cos. He holds degrees from Texas State University-San Mar­cos and Cen­tral Michi­gan Uni­ver­sity. He com­pleted a 20-year Air Force career, retir­ing as Lieu­tenant Colonel.

Dr. Carol Whit­craft Fredericks

Dr. Whit­craft Fred­er­icks has held five dis­tinctly dif­fer­ent careers; she retired from the LBJ School of Pub­lic Affairs at the Uni­ver­sity of Texas at Austin in 1993. Dr. Fred­er­icks has served on advi­sory boards and com­mit­tees for Texas State Uni­ver­sity, Uni­ver­sity of Texas, and Lock Haven Uni­ver­sity. In addi­tion, she has made major con­tri­bu­tions of sup­port and scholarships.

Mr. Sam Zigrossi

Mr. Zigrossi is Pro­gram Direc­tor at Charles A. Dana Cen­ter, Uni­ver­sity of Texas at Austin. He holds M.S. and M.B.A. degrees and cur­rently serves as an adjunct pro­fes­sor of busi­ness at Texas State University-San Mar­cos. Sam is a retired exec­u­tive from IBM. His pub­li­ca­tions include Per­son­nel Advi­sor: Hand­book for small and medium sized com­pa­nies. He has been hon­ored with numer­ous awards for leadership.