Everette E. Dennis

Dr. Everette E. Dennis has served as Dean and CEO of Northwestern University in Qatar since June 2011. He holds a tenured full professorship in the Medill School of Journalism at NU’s home campus in Evanston, Illinois and an appointment by courtesy in the School of Communication. Dr. Dennis is a widely-known institution-builder, educator and author having led several organizations over a distinguished career in higher education, foundations and advanced study centers. In Qatar at NU-Q, he has strengthened the curriculum, expanded the faculty, built a research program and led major outreach efforts putting the school on the map regionally and globally. On his watch a Middle East studies program was initiated as well as a joint-minor with Georgetown University Qatar on media and politics. He organized the Qatar Media Industries Forum, which brings together leadership of local industries as well as fostering partnerships with Al Jazeera Networks and the Doha Film Institute. On the research front, the Dean has led three major surveys of Media Use in the Middle East in 2013, 2014 and 2015, which are the most comprehensive in the region to date. These studies are accompanied by an interactive website at mideastmedia.org.

Prior to his appointment at NU-Q, Dr. Dennis was the Felix E. Larkin Distinguished Professor of Communication and Media Management at Fordham’s Graduate School of Business in New York City where he served as departmental chair and head of the Center for Communication. Previously he was founding director of the Gannett Center for Media Studies (subsequently the Freedom Forum) at Columbia University for more than a decade—and served as senior vice present of the parent foundation as well as head of its international consortium on media studies. Concurrent with his Fordham appointment, he was founding president of the American Academy in Berlin, working with Richard Holbrooke and Henry Kissinger and, later, was executive director of the International Longevity Center.

His academic career included service as dean and professor at the School of Journalism and Communication at the University of Oregon; nine years at the University of Minnesota where he rose from the rank of instructor to full professor and served as director of graduate studies. He began his career in education at Kansas State University where he was interim department chair while also directing the Mental Health Mass Communications Program, a federally funded project. He had visiting appointments at Northwestern and the University of Oregon where he had been an undergraduate. His master's is from the S.I. Newhouse School of Communications at Syracuse University and his Ph.D. from the University of Minnesota.

His advanced fellowships include the Liberal Arts Fellowship in Law at Harvard Law School, a research fellowship at the Institute of Politics, and a visiting Nieman fellowship, all at Harvard University. Other academic awards include a Bush Summer Fellowship at Harvard, a media law and ethics summer fellowship at Stanford University and a popular culture fellowship at the East-West Center in Honolulu. He became a much quoted expert on media issues during his stewardship at the Gannett Center, one of the world’s first media think tanks, where he established an advanced fellows program, organized a technology laboratory, conducted major conferences and served as founder and editor-in -chief of the Media Studies Journal. He is author, co-author or editor of more than 45 books on media industries, media law and related topics—as well as more than 200 refereed journal articles. His global media studies include monographs on Eastern and Central, Europe, Latin America and East Asia. 

A leader in journalism education, he served as national president of the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication and led a task force on curricular reform and the future of the field, which resulted in an influential document titled, Planning for Curricular Change in Journalism and Mass Communication Education, still regarded as one of the most comprehensive assessments ever done, according to a 2014 Journalism Monograph on the history of journalism education. He has written widely on technology issues and convergence both in education and in media industries. His text with Melvin L. DeFleur, Understanding Mass Communication (subsequently Understanding Media in the Digital Age), was widely adopted in journalism schools for more than 30 years. Another innovative text titled, Media Debates, Great Issues for the Digital Age, coauthored with John C. Merrill, and has also been widely used. Dennis has also been a leader in developing and administering graduate and advanced fellowship programs including the Mental Health Mass Communication Fellowships at Kansas State, the WCCO Minority Fellowships in broadcasting at the University of Minnesota; the Gannett Center Fellowships Columbia University, and the Berlin Prize Fellowships at the American Academy in Berlin.

Various leadership roles held by the Dean include chair of the National Advisory Committee of the Fred Rogers Center for Early Childhood Education and Children’s Media, membership on the corporate board of the International Center for Journalists and several others. He is an elected life member of the Council on Foreign Relations and an elected life member of the American Antiquarian Society of which he is a former counsellor (trustee). He has served as trustee of the International Museum of Photography at Eastman House, trustee of American Academy in Berlin and several others. In Qatar, he is a member of the advisory board of the Translation and Interpretation Institute, and a member of the Board of Governors of the Academic Bridge Program and Am Cham, the American Chamber of Commerce. He also serves as an advisory board member for World Innovation Summit for Health.