Charles Whitaker has been named dean of the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University. He has served as interim dean since July 2018.
Professor Whitaker has been a member of the Medill faculty since 1993. He teaches undergraduate and graduate courses on news writing, magazine writing, magazine editing, and blogging. He also teaches in Northwestern’s School of Professional Studies and the High School Journalism Institute. Before coming to Northwestern, he served as a senior editor at Ebony magazine, a news reporter at the Miami Herald, and as a deputy feature editor, enterprise feature, and arts writer at the Louisville Times.
For his successful career in journalism, Professor Whitaker has received commendations from a number of journalism societies including the National Association of Black Journalists, the Society of Professional Journalists, and the National Education Writers Association. Recently, he was elected to the national board of the American Society of Magazine Editors.
As a researcher, Professor Whitaker has studied the ontological and methodological similarities and differences between immersion journalism and social science field research, and the efficacy of single-gender schools in improving the academic achievement of African-American boys. He is the co-author of Magazine Writing (Routledge, 2014), a textbook that examines the magazine industry and deconstructs the art of feature writing for consumer and business-to-business publications.
Professor Whitaker holds a bachelor’s degree and master’s degree both from Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism. He is currently a doctoral candidate in human development and social policy in Northwestern’s School of Education and Social Policy.
