April 8, 2019
Louise Benjamin awarded 2019 Broadcast Education Association Distinguished Education Service Award
Submitted by College of Arts and Sciences
Louise Benjamin, College of Arts and Sciences' Associate Dean for Academic Affairs and professor in the A.Q. Miller School of Journalism and Mass Communications, has been named the 2019 Broadcast Education Association's Distinguished Education Service Award, or DESA, winner.
The award is presented to an individual who has made a significant and lasting contribution to the American system of electronic media education.
"BEA has been a major home for my academic endeavors, and it is so flattering to be recognized by my peers with this award," Benjamin said when she received the award during association's annual convention awards ceremony in Las Vegas on Sunday, April 7.
Benjamin has been a Broadcast Education Association member since 1981 and has served with the association's Research Committee and Festival Committee, and as an officer in both the History Division and the Law Division. She has served on the Journal of Broadcasting and Electronic Media's editorial board since 1989 and on the Publications Committee from 1989 to 1997. Between 2008 and 2011, she was the journal's book review editor. She continues to serve as the association's Electronic Media Series, editor, with the Routledge/Taylor Francis Group. In 2015, she was invited to make a Broadcast Education Association Podium Presentation to showcase her research in history and regulation of electronic media, especially early broadcast radio.
She was among the founders of the Broadcast Education Association Festival of Media Arts in the mid-to-late 1990s. She served on the Broadcast Education Association Board-appointed small exploratory committee during the festival's formative years that developed the foundations of the festival organization and helped launch the actual festival. She chaired the Festival Committee from 2004-2008. In those early years, the festival grew substantially and became a fixture of the association. One lasting contribution of the Festival of Media Arts has been the establishment of tenure and promotion standards.
Benjamin has authored numerous conference presentations, published articles and book chapters on media law and history as well as two books, "The NBC Advisory Council and Radio Program Development, 1926-1945" and "Freedom of the Air and the Public Interest: First Amendment Rights in Broadcasting to 1935," which received the National Communication Association's Franklyn S. Haiman Award for Distinguished Scholarship in Freedom of Expression. Her "Sarnoff Radio Music Box Memo" research has been a lasting landmark for scholars and students, helping them understand the medium of radio as a new technology.
The Broadcast Education Association is the premier international academic media organization, driving insights, excellence in media production, and career advancement for educators, students, and professionals. Visit www.beaweb.org for more information.