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Marcus Messner is a professor of journalism as well as the interim director of the Richard T. Robertson School of Media and Culture at Virginia Commonwealth University. In the past, Messner has served as VCU's associate director and as coordinator for research and innovation. He has also served as the head of the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication's (AEJMC) Communication Technology Division and is currently a member of the AEJMC's teaching committee. He is well known for his IPadJournos program which he both created and teaches at Virginia Commonwealth University. He is also known for serving as co-Academic director of the Social Media Institute of the Iraqi Young Leaders Exchange Program with Jeff South. Before becoming a professor, Messner worked as a politics and business Journalist both in Germany, his native country, and in the United States. He has been featured in various notable publications such as Associated Press, The New York Times, and The Washington Post for his vast knowledge of social and digital media. He has also won many awards for his notable research and excellent teaching practices.

Education

Messner recieved his B.A. at Angelo State University in Texas. He then went on to receive his M.A. in Print Journalism as well as his Ph.D. in Communication from The University of Miami in Florida.

Research Interest

Messner's research interest mainly focuses on digital media and its ability to influence journalism and public relations. In one of his most popular studies, "The Source Cycle", Messner looks at how traditional media are increasingly using weblogs as credible sources of information and vice versa. In another well known study conducted in 2012, Messner looked at how the use of Twitter can affect how well newspapers and television stations get information to the public.
Messner is also interested in crisis information and how it is communicated through the media to the respective publics. He has had his research in this area published in PRNews' The Book of Employee Communications.

IPadJournos

In 2012, Messner had an idea to create a class at Virginia Commonwealth University that was designed to teach students in the journalism program how to make news stories using nothing but IPads. He appropriately titled this class, IPadJournos. The class taught and allowed students to immediately film, report, and place their news stories on social media. It also allowed them to quickly begin writing a longer, more complete version of their story which was to be featured on the local news station WTVRTV - CBS 6. Messner's program was one of the first to use only mobile devices as a way to report on current news and events. In fact, when talking about the success of the program, Messner has reported that his students were sometimes faster at getting their stories out than the professional journalist working at the news station.

Iraqi Young Leaders Exchange Program

From 2010 to 2016, Marcus Messner serve as co-Academic director of the Social Media Institute of the Iraqi Young Leaders Exchange Program. He partnered with Jeff South to teach a class in social media networking to undergraduate students visiting from Iraq as well as students already attending Virginia Common Wealth University. These students spent four weeks over the summer learning to use various social media platforms to create campaigns for a nonprofit organization of their choice. In fact, Messner has stated that this program is what inspired him to create the IPadJournos program. Is addition, students were given the chance to listen to guest speakers who helped the students with their projects. The participants of this program have reported that it was a valuable learning experience for them.

Awards and Accomplishments

In 2017, Virginia Commonwealth University honored Messner with the Distinguished Teaching Award. In 2015, Messner was awarded the IPR W. Ward White Award for Top Three Papers of Practical Significance at International Public Relations Research Conference. This award is given to papers that discuss problems and solutions for the public relations industry and those that work in it. That same year, Messner was also awarded first place in the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication's (AEJMC) Best Practices in Teaching Online and Blended Learning competition. In 2013 Messner received an Emerging Scholar Award from the AEJMC. The Emerging Scholar award gives grants to the four best research or teaching proposals dealing with projects in Journalism and Mass Communications. In both 2013 and 2011, Messner received the Page Legacy Scholar Award from the Arthur W. Page Center for Integrity in Public Communication. This award is given to scholars who published research dealing with the ethics of public communication. The AEJMC named Messner a Promising Professor in 2011 due to his excellent teaching. In total, Messner has received more than $1.3 million in grants and funding for his research.

Notable Publications

Messner has approximately 110 academic publications and presentations. Some of his most notable and most cited text include:

• Messner, M., & Distaso, M.W. (2008). "The Source Cycle." Journalism Studies, 9(3), 447.
• Messner, M., Linke, M., Eford, A. (2012). "Shoveling tweets: An analysis of the microblogging engagement of traditional news organizations." International Symposium on Online Journalism, 2(1), 74-87.
• Guidry, J. P. D., Carlyle, K., Messner, M., & Jin, Y. (2015). "On pins and needles: How vaccines are portrayed on Pinterest." Vaccine, 33(39), 5051–5056.
• Brummette, J., DiStaso, M., Vafeiadis, M., & Messner, M. (2018). Read All About It: The Politicization of “Fake News” on Twitter. Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly, 2, 497.