Professor Renee Hobbs has dedicated 30+ years to media literacy education through teaching, researching, writing books, and creating supportive communities for educators.

One of those communities is the Media Education Lab, which equips educators to teach students how to access, critically evaluate, and create media on their own. Many countries, including the US, need this skill to bridge political and cultural polarization gaps.

After hosting the University of Rhode Island's Summer Institute in Digital Literacy in-person for eight years, Renee moved the program online with Pathwright in 2020. She discovered unexpected positive side effects.

Participant diversity increased because hotel and travel expenses were no longer barriers. Four teachers from a Navajo reservation and educators from Brazil, Romania, and other underserved communities joined online. Renee reflected, "Our online community grew more diverse and deeply collaborative and intensified our feelings of connection across time and space."

Media Education Lab also saw a spike in participation overall. 10,248 unique individuals joined its Zoom meetings in 2020.

In 2021, Renee published a new book on propaganda, Mind Over Media, and an online companion course that models the learning activities in her book. Renee hopes this course will help educators engage with students in analyzing current events, propaganda, and disinformation.

You can read Renee's full-length interview on our blog.

Reach Out & Read resources and trains physicians and advance practice providers to encourage parents to read with their children, a family activity proven to be crucial to a child's cognitive, social, and emotional development.

In 2016, Teandra Ramos-Hardy had the opportunity to take years’ worth of expertise and training and transform it into online courses for Reach Out & Read Carolinas. Through her efforts, it was suddenly much easier for Reach Out and Read providers to receive training and certified medical education credits.

Teandra's already important work became essential in a new way in March 2020. Many families were under immense stress, and the care doctors provided as well as the free books they prescribed to young children were and continue to be especially helpful for families in need.

By September 2020, Teandra had seen a 57% overall increase in engagement with courses from the previous year. And the courses that she promoted in March grew rapidly (e.g. engagement for "Building Resilience in Children & Families" increased by 750%).

Busy doctors and practitioners took time from their schedules to read children's books live on social media to promote family health and togetherness — a testament to the effectiveness of Teandra's courses and ROR's message. Here's one of those Facebook book readings from Family Nurse Practitioner, Mr. Francisco Rojo.

The 4A's provides leadership and direction for over 600 advertising agencies, accounting for 85% of U.S. advertising spend.

In a critical moment, when most companies were canceling their 2020 internship programs, Sean McGlade stayed nimble. He helped the 4A's Foundation team transform their multicultural advertising internship program (MAIP) of 47 years into the online MAIP Virtual Engagement Program.

For decades, MAIP has helped diverse students launch their agency careers and supplied the industry with a vital and vibrant talent pipeline. But this year was different; with the traditional model rendered impossible, the 4A's reimagined the program and partnered with agencies and brands to deliver a project-based experience focused on craft skills, cross training, and community-building. The program was a resounding success (see 2020 Fellowship Impact).

Sean and the MAIP team had the courage to innovate in the face of an extreme challenge. They made sure opportunity didn't get canceled for the 354 MAIP Fellows of 2020.