Dr. Tim Bajkiewicz teaching students video storytelling during the Iraqi Young Leaders Exchange Program in summer 2011. Photo by Dr. Marcus Messner.

A Mass Comm broadcast journalism professor has been accepted to a five-day program in early June focused on academic administration.

Dr. Tim Bajkiewicz, associate professor, will attend the Scripps Howard Academic Leadership Academy in the Manship School of Mass Communication at Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge from June 3-7.

“I’m excited about the chance to learn more about what it’s like to lead and manage in the academic world,” Bajkiewicz said. “I have experience managing in media, but companies and universities are run very differently.”

According to the LSU website, “The Academy, now in its sixth year, brings select up-and-coming mass communication professionals and scholars together with seasoned administrators to share administrative strategies and insights.”

The academy is sponsored by Scripps Howard, part of the E.W. Scripps Co., which owns more than 30 daily and community newspapers and television stations, along with the Scripps Howard News Service.

Since fall 2010, Bajkiewicz has served as the School’s undergraduate journalism sequence coordinator. This position takes care of scheduling and curriculum issues for Mass Comm’s ten full-time journalism faculty, 10 adjunct instructors and approximately 400 undergraduate journalism students.

Bajkiewicz asked for a letter of recommendation from Richard Cole, the John Kerr distinguished professor and dean emeritus at the School of Journalism and Mass Communications at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, where Bajkiewicz earned his Ph.D. in 2002. In October Cole led the site team that recommended the School’s recent national reaccreditation.

“I believe he would be an excellent administrator of a [journalism and mass communication] school, and your academy is precisely what he needs now.  We always need outstanding leaders in our field.  And Tim is well on his way,” Cole wrote.

Bajkiewicz came to VCU in fall 2008 after seven years on faculty at the University of South Florida. VCU awarded him tenure in May.