Class Notes

Jeff Tahler (Comm) is the managing director at Madica Productions. Madica's hit Netflix series Ginny and Georgia is currently in production of its second season. The company’s YouTube series Brave Mission amassed more than 4.5 million views in the first month of its release.

Jason Gewirtz (Jour) was in Tokyo to cover his fifth Olympic Games as editor and publisher of SportsTravel magazine. In June, he was named to the board of directors of the Sports Events and Tourism Association.

Julie (Dybdahl) Meidlinger (MJour) is program coordinator for Raritan, a quarterly journal of politics and letters based at Rutgers University in New Brunswick, New Jersey.

Jason Gewirtz (Jour) will attend his fifth Olympic Games in 2020 for SportsTravel magazine, where he has served as editor and publisher since 2014. Recently, he moderated a session on the economic impact of running events at the IAAF Global Running Conference in Lanzhou, China. He and his wife, Niki (CommDisor’94), live in Centennial with their son, Jonas.   

After 18 years at 9News in Denver, Cheryl Preheim (Comm) anchored her last newscast for the station in 2016. The Indiana native has interviewed countless newsmakers, including former President Jimmy Carter and Nobel Peace Prize recipient Malala Yousafzai. Cheryl and her family now live in Atlanta, Georgia, where she works as a morning anchor for WXIA. 

In June 2017, Alison (Ali) Bay (Jour)  was appointed deputy press secretary for Californian Gov. Jerry Brown Jr. She previously served as the deputy director for the California Department of Public Health's Offic eof Public Affairs. Alsion has lived in California for 20 years. 

David Smail (Advert) is a professor of practice in CMCI’s Department of Advertising, Public Relations and Media Design. Before returning to CU Boulder in 2016, David served as the chairman and executive director of BBDO Vietnam.

Tracey Marx Bernstein (Jour) is an executive producer at Yahoo. She creates content in the diversity, equity, inclusion and belonging (DEI&B) space, celebrating different cultures, identities and backgrounds.

Brent Schrotenboer (Jour), an enterprise and investigative reporter for USA Today, recently won three national top 10 writing awards from the Associated Press Sports Editors for work he did in 2021. Schrotenboer has received 11 national top 10 awards since 2014. He has been with USA Today since 2012 and covers legal, business and social issues related to sports. He lives in San Diego, California.

Sabine Kortals Stein (Bus, Mus’91; MJour) works closely with the dean of the College of Music and the assistant dean for concerts and communications. Additionally, she serves as editor of the college's annual magazine, and edits and contributes to other print and digital publications. She also serves on the College of Music’s diversity committee. Stein’s career comprises music journalism and for-profit and nonprofit communications.

John Branch (MJour) is a Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter for The New York Times. He’s renowned for covering the offbeat in the sporting world, from alligator hunting to wingsuit flying. He’s the bestselling author of two books that have been featured multiple times in Best American Sports Writing, and his most recent book was released on June 1, 2021. He lives in the San Francisco Bay Area.

John Branch (MJour’96) is a Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter for the New York Times. He is renowned for covering offbeat stories in the sporting world, from alligator hunting to wingsuit flying. He is the bestselling author of two books that have been featured multiple times in Best American Sports Writing and his most recent book will be released on June 1, 2021. He lives in the San Francisco Bay Area.

Leslie Oliver (Jour) is director of media and external communications at Comcast NBCUniversal. Previously, she was the communications and policy director for U.S. Rep. Ed Perlmutter. After following her brother, David Oliver (Jour’91), to CU Boulder, Leslie lived in Washington, D.C., where she worked as a political consultant and with trade and nonprofit organizations. She is a CU football season ticket holder and recovering attorney, and has lived in Denver since 2000.

Brent Schrotenboer (Jour), an enterprise and investigative reporter for USA Today, won his 11th national top 10 writing award since 2014 from the Associated Press Sports Editors, including those he won in 2021 with colleagues in explanatory reporting, projects reporting and event coverage. He has been with USA Today since 2012 and lives in San Diego, California. He has won 20 APSE national top 10 awards since 2001.

This year, Kelly Graziadei (Advert) and her co-founder, Joanna Lee Shevelenko, announced and closed their first institutional venture capital fund, f7 Ventures. The venture capital fund was one of the largest first-time funds launched by female operators. This is particularly notable with only 4% of VC firms in the U.S. led by women. The $50 million fund includes a respected and diverse set of limited partners, and 70% of their investments have been to underrepresented founders.

Alanna Rizzo (Bus’97; MJour’03), a seven-time Emmy Award winner, rejoined MLB Network’s roster of on-air personalities where she is a contributor to High Heat with Christopher Russo. Rizzo has also covered the Los Angeles Dodgers’ trips to the World Series in 2017, 2018 and 2020. She most recently won the 2020 Southern California Sports Broadcasters Association’s TV Reporter Award. In July 2021, Rizzo made history as part of the first all-woman broadcast crew to call a Major League Baseball game. In 2019, she founded Guidry’s Guardian Foundation, a nonprofit organization that helps rescue dogs from the streets and out of high-kill shelters.

Lee Hood (MJour; PhDComm’01) is an associate professor at Loyola University Chicago where she won the national Edward L. Bliss Award for Distinguished Broadcast Journalism Education in 2018. She taught broadcast journalism at CU Boulder from 2000 to 2009 after an 18-year career in TV news.

Anthony Martini (Hist, Jour) is director of content strategy and design with AT&T, where he leads a team that develops guidance for 150,000+ frontline representatives and call center agents across the company. He, his wife and two daughters love exploring Colorado and supporting local charities like Bags of Fun and the American Heart Association.

Since 2003, Norm Shearer (Advert) has been chief creative officer at Cactus, one of Colorado’s top creative advertising agencies. A graduate of the Art Center College of Design in California, Norm lives in Denver with his wife, Dawn. 

Don Heider (PhDComm) served as dean of the Loyola University Chicago School of Communication from 2008 to 2018 and received the Scripps Howard Foundation Journalism & Mass Communication Administrator of the Year Award in August 2018. Shortly after, he accepted a position with Santa Clara University, where he is the chief executive of the Markkula Center for Applied Ethics.