Brett Kurland, an award-winning sports journalist and entrepreneur and founding director of the Cronkite News Phoenix Sports Bureau at the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication, has been promoted to assistant dean for Instruction and Partnerships at the Cronkite School.
In Kurland’s new role, he will oversee the Cronkite News bureaus in Phoenix, Washington, D.C., and Los Angeles, and the Cronkite Sports bureaus in Phoenix and Los Angeles. His responsibilities will also include overseeing the Television Production and Graphics Lab, Public Relations Lab, Digital Audiences Lab, the JET Lab, and the New Media Innovation and Entrepreneurship Lab.
In addition, Kurland will lead the training and onboarding for the Cronkite School’s faculty associates and work to ensure best practices for using educational technology, including Adobe Creative Suite, across the curriculum. A member of the Cronkite School’s executive leadership team, he will also continue to cultivate beneficial partnerships with the sports industry, including those he’s already helped build with the United States Olympic & Paralympic Committee, the NFL, the NCAA, the Sports Journalism Institute and the Pac-12 Conference.
“We are incredibly fortunate to have Brett expand his leadership duties and responsibilities. Brett has done a remarkable job serving as the director of sports programs and strategic initiatives, playing a leading role in building our sports program into the top sports journalism program in the country,” said Cronkite School Dean Battinto L. Batts Jr. “He has led the strategy behind our bachelor’s and master’s degree programs in sports journalism. Those programs now boast more than 500 students.”
Kurland joined the Cronkite School in 2014 full-time as the founding director of the Phoenix Sports Bureau of Cronkite News. In the sports bureau, now successfully led by Paola Boivin, Kurland mentored students in award-winning multi-platform coverage of professional, collegiate and high school sports across Arizona for professional media outlets including The Arizona Republic, Arizona PBS, Fox Sports, Pac-12 Networks and ArizonaSports.com.
Before joining the Cronkite School, Kurland was an Emmy Award-winning sports producer & multimedia entrepreneur with more than 16 years of experience producing content across various platforms, ranging from mobile phones to broadcast television networks. His awards include a National Sports Emmy Award, four Telly Awards, a W3 Award, a Webby Award and Emmy Award nominations.
Kurland holds a bachelor of science degree from Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism, Media, Integrated Marketing Communications and an MBA from Northwestern’s Kellogg School of Management.