Rate My Professor Suzy Smith

Suzy Smith serves as Department Chair of the Department of Media and Associate Professor of Media at Ball State University. She earned her Bachelor's degree from Central Michigan University and her Master's degree from Georgia State University. Before academia, Smith amassed over 24 years in the news industry, holding key positions such as senior producer at CNN.com, senior producer at the Weather Channel, supervising producer at CNN/Sports Illustrated, and producer at CNN Sports. These roles honed her expertise in multimedia news and sports production, which she now imparts to students.

At Ball State, Smith specializes in teaching news and sports writing, reporting, and multimedia story presentation, with a focus on delivering content across diverse storytelling formats. She has pioneered immersive learning experiences, including a baseball journalism course where students travel to Florida for spring training coverage, and a dedicated live reporting course integrated into the regular curriculum. Smith led a student trip to China in 2010 for immersive media experiences and mentored Ball State journalists at the Olympics in 2012, 2014, and 2016, enabling them to produce content for professional outlets. Her leadership extends to serving on the national board of the Broadcast Education Association and co-directing three U.S. State Department Study of the U.S. Institutes for Student Leaders on New Media in Journalism in 2011, 2012, and 2013, hosting international students from Indonesia, Malaysia, and the Philippines. Under her chairmanship, the Department of Media has earned accolades such as Regional Emmy Awards for studio renovations and top national rankings for sports media programs from the Broadcast Education Association.