Tudor Vlad

Dr. Tudor Vlad, assistant director of the James M. Cox Jr. Center for International Mass Communication Training and Research, believes that no matter where in the world a journalist is, the most important thing is trust.


“If people think that the journalist is honest, if they get to a certain level of trust, then the people will understand that what they [say] to the journalist will be reflected accurately,” said Vlad when talking to a group of journalism students Monday.

Vlad, who grew up in communist Romania and worked there as a journalist for 10 years and then helped re-build the Romanian media after the fall of communism, now works through the Cox Center to train journalists in developing countries.

Always working to help improve the quality of journalism around the world, Vlad is heading to the Republic of Moldova to continue to instruct more journalists Friday.

Vlad also emphasized building levels of trusts with journalists in other countries and how it helps break down barriers. “Once we reached that level of trust there were no taboo topics,” he said.


To see more from the interview with Tudor about his work in Mindinao, watch the video below.

ACC Mayor and Commission Meeting

The Boys and Girls Club and the Athens-Clarke County School District were given something to smile about Thursday when the Athens-Clarke County Mayor and Commission approved the placement of the Youth Facility Partnership on the April 6 consent agenda.


“I’m very proud that Athens-Clarke County is contributing to this project,” said Alice Kinman, district four commissioner.

The Youth Facility Partnership is an agreement between the School District, the Unified Government, the Boys and Girls Club and the Housing Authority that allows for the renovation and instatement of after school programs at the H.T. Edwards Gymnasium.

The programs will be put on by the Boys and Girls Club and will include both an after school program and a nine week summer day camp for youth ages six to 13. The after school program will go from 2:30 p.m. to 7 p.m. Monday through Friday during the school year, and the summer day camp will run from 8:30 a.m. until 5 p.m. during the months of June through August.

“I am very excited it is going to happen,” Kinman said about the partnership.

All-American Flunkie

Dan Magill, 89, a writer, athlete, coach, curator of the Intercollegiate Tennis Association Collegiate Tennis Hall of Fame and longtime sports information director, has spent almost his entire life in Athens and around the University of Georgia.

“I was an all-American flunkie. I used to cut the grass in Sanford Stadium,” said Magill when he spoke to a journalism class on Monday, March 15.

His earliest memories of Athens are playing sports at the Athens YMCA when it first opened when he was six-years-old and it was only the third in the country. Then, in 1931, Magill was the bat-boy for the university baseball team. Later, he won the state high school 100-yard breast stroke at Legion Pool, and went on to not only coach the university tennis team but continued his involvement with the university and became the director of sports communications.

Magill spends his time these days as the curator of the ITA Collegiate Tennis Hall of Fame, which is the only museum of its kind in the country. When he isn’t doing that he is sharing stories with students, the other people of Athens, and participating in his new favorite sport, which he says is “when they kick off in Sanford Stadium and 95,000 people are whoopin’ it up.”

Johnathan McGinty

Johnathan McGinty, a former sports writer for The Athens Banner Herald and avid blogger, told UGA journalism students Monday that he will be launching his new project, the Northeast Georgia Sportsline, at the end of the week.

McGinty, 31, started his first blog in 2003 and “did not have the faintest idea as to what a blog was." Since then, McGinty has gained more experience with blogging and social media, including his current blog, Beyond the Trestle, which covers politics in Northeast Georgia and follows McGinty’s blog model of “commentary, coverage and context."

Northeast Georgia Sports Line will cover sports for nine private and public high schools in the Athens and Oconee County area as well as the local sports scene.

To supplement his blog, McGinty plans to put out four print publications per year, three of which being high school sports previews and the fourth being a local area golf guide.

McGinty also will be enlisting the help of a student from each high school as sports bloggers who will write about his or her school on a regular basis.

A Taste of Oconee

     Looking to spice up your evening by combining local food with some live music? A Taste of Oconee, which will be held on Saturday from 5 to 8 p.m. at the Oconee Civic Center, may be the event for you.

     The evening will feature music from the Oconee County Middle School fine arts program as well as food from a number of local vendors and serve as a fundraiser for the fine arts program. A raffle will feature pieces of art, local services and many other items.

     Tickets are on sale now and can be purchased from any OCMS Band or Chorus student, in the OCMS front office, at the Oconee Civic Center or at the Chamber of Commerce.