Claflin University Professor and Chair of the Department of Mass Communications Dr. Donna Gough has been selected by the Broadcast Education Association to chair its Historically Black Colleges and Universities Membership Initiative Committee.
The Gough-led committee is to encourage more diversity within the membership of BEA, the national association for educators in broadcasting and media. Gough also serves as vice chair of the Two-Year & Small Colleges Interest Division for BEA.
“BEA is dedicated to diversity. So I hope that the committee will be able to encourage more minorities and women to join BEA in order to make the organization, itself, more diverse and to encourage new ideas and grow new leadership for the organization,” Gough said.
She will be working with professors from universities across the United States as well as professionals from the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences and the College of the Bahamas. Gough will be joined by fellow Claflin faculty and Department of Mass Communications instructors Dr. Patrick Stearns and Bianca Crawford.
Gough is founder and treasurer of the South Carolina Media Education Association. In addition, she served as president of the Oklahoma Broadcast Education Association and as president of the Oklahoma Speech Theatre Communication Association.
“These past experiences have enabled me to work and to represent Claflin University at the national level. Claflin is a great institution and deserves to be represented nationally,” she said.
Gough came to Claflin University in August 2009 to serve as chair and professor for the Department of Mass Communications. She holds a bachelor-of-arts degree in theatre arts from Texas A&M University in College Station, Texas, and a master of arts in theatre, film and television from Regent University in Virginia Beach, Virginia. Gough earned a doctor-of-philosophy degree in mass communication at the University of Oklahoma in Norman, Oklahoma.
She is a 2014 Fellow at the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences in Los Angeles and a longtime Rotarian with the Rotary Club of St. Matthews.