SUNY Oswego will host the Dr. Lewis B. O’Donnell Media Summit on Oct. 27 with a full day of in-person events planned including special sessions and a live panel in Waterman Theatre. 

The summit is going back to its previous model which includes both an in-person and a virtual option for students and professors who want to “tune in” to the speakers, according to Event Director Abby Czerwonka.

“Going back to in-person is really just the excitement factor,” Czerwonka said. “We’re excited for students to get out of their dorm rooms and get out of their houses and join us for a full day of events.”

This year, special sessions, or individual presentations by speakers, begin at 9:10 a.m. in classrooms around campus and via Zoom. There is a discussion with Chrissy Guest, an associate professor of media, arts, sciences and studies at Ithaca College, following the other speakers before the panel begins at 3 p.m.

The theme for the 2021 Media Summit was announced Sept. 13 to be “On-Demand In-Demand: Audiences and the Future of Video Streaming” which Czerwonka said has been an idea for the event for a while. 

“We had been talking about it for a few years,” Czerwonka said. “We originally had the idea of video streaming last year but we put that on hold because we thought the topic we had last year with COVID and the election was a bit more time sensitive.”

The 2020 summit theme was “On the Frontline with the First Amendment” and took place completely virtual via Zoom. Promotions Director Sonya Kordovich said the past few events had all been about trust in the media and though that is important, there are other ideas they wanted to focus on.

“In the last couple years we kind of had the direction of mistrust and fake news,” Kordovich said. “We wanted to steer away to other topics that are relevant in the media such as … audiences and the future of video streaming.”

Czerwonka said she hopes this year’s theme resonates with students because they have always been around different types of streaming technology.

“The general students around my age, 18-22, we grew up in that transition into video streaming,” Czerwonka said. “We grew up with VCRs and it quickly transformed into DVDs and so we kind of saw the change of how video streaming happened and the big market it created.”

She also said the theme will hopefully help prepare students going into a media field after graduation for how fast technology can change.

The panelists for the Media Summit will be presenting on their experiences in a professional setting. The panel for this year includes Guest Renard Jenkins, vice president of content transmission and production technology for Warner Media; Jamie Duemo, media and entertainment business development leader for Amazon Web Services; and Frank Palumbo, vice president of a local television station and a 1983 SUNY Oswego graduate.

The panel will be moderated by Justin Dobrow, a 2017 graduate and supervisor of program operations for NBC Universal, and will answer pre-submitted questions from students. Having all the questions before the event begins is one change that was continued from last year’s virtual session. 

After the event, students will have the opportunity to meet with other SUNY Oswego alumni who are attending as career connectors. 

Career connectors are alumni who have graduated in the past 10 years and currently work in the media industry. Some career connectors for this year include Travis Clark, class of 2017 alum and a senior media reporter for Insider; Geselle Martinez, class of 2017 alum who currently works as a stage manager for CBS Mornings; Matt Stone of the class of 2015, a segment producer at Good Morning America/ABC News; and Imani Cruz, class of 2017, now a talent, casting and series development assistant for MTV Networks.

Gab Candela, the career connectors coordinator, said she is most looking forward to this portion of the event because it is what originally inspired her to become a public relations major.

“[I’m so excited] to meet the panelists and career connectors because we haven’t had an in-person summit in two years,” Candela said. “I remember the day of my first year that I did it, [the] whole day was just so exciting and rewarding, that’s when I really figured out I wanted to major in PR, was from the Media Summit.”

As coordinator, Candela works closely with the alumni as she contacts and manages each one. She began reaching out to potential speakers two weeks ago and will personally escort one of them around campus during the day of the Media Summit. 

“Since I’m on the e-board, we are all ambassadors for either career connectors or panelists,” Candela said. 

Kordovich said she is most excited about this portion of the day because the connectors come from different fields and have a wide range of experiences. 

“There are some really cool people who are SUNY Oswego alumni,” Kordovich said. “It will be so nice to meet them and hear about their positions and possibly connect with them after I graduate in May.”

The career connectors networking event will be held from 4:30 to 6 p.m. in the Tyler Hall Lobby. A complete schedule for the day can be found on the Media Summit website.

Image via SUNY Oswego Media Summit