Lecturer
Admissions Coordinator
Contact:
243 Andersen
402.472.7050
mhassler3@unl.edu
Bio
Michelle Carr Hassler is a lecturer and admissions coordinator for the College of Journalism and Mass Communications. She has been teaching at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln since 1998.
Before coming to UNL, she was a newspaper reporter and editor for 16 years, beginning as education reporter at the Tempe Daily News and Mesa Tribune. She also served as state editor at the Lincoln Journal and night city editor and interim editorial page editor at the Lincoln Journal Star. She has been a frequent freelance contributor to several magazines, including PC Today and Midwest Living.
Hassler has received several teaching honors. She and colleague Sue Burzynski Bullard won third place in the 2011 national Teaching News Terrifically in the 21st Century competition, sponsored by the News Division of the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication (AEJMC.)
Her teaching also was honored in 2004, 2005 and 2007 by the UNL Teacher's Council and the UNL Parents Association, which recognize faculty, advisers and staff members who have had a significant impact on the lives of one or more undergraduates.
Hassler also serves as the college’s coordinator for the News21 program, a journalism initiative funded by the Carnegie Corporation of New York and the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation of Miami to promote in-depth and innovative journalism. In the spring of 2011, she co-taught a reporting seminar on food safety with professors from Arizona State University and Maryland University to prepare students for a 10-week national reporting project in Phoenix that produced a news website, “How Safe Is Your Food?”
She currently is teaching Journalism 450, the capstone online journalism course, in which students produce content for NewsNetNebraska, the college’s news website. She also works with students in the Mass Media Perspective learning community, a group of freshmen who meet weekly to learn about programs that help them succeed academically, to network with people in the field and to connect with alumni.
As admissions coordinator, she advises the college’s J Ambassadors, a group of students who help the college recruit prospective students. She also served as adviser to the UNL chapter of the National Society of Collegiate Scholars for five years.
She is a member of the Nebraska Press Women and Investigative Reporters and Editors.
Her interests include using online tools and social media for reporting and community engagement; news curation; and online visual storytelling.
She received a bachelor's degree in journalism and a master's in English, both from UNL.
Curriculum vitae available upon request.
