Andrea Tanner named new director of USC journalism school

Andrea Tanner is the new director of the School of Journalism and Mass Communications at the University of South Carolina. Tanner has been serving as interim director since July.

“Andrea has impressed the faculty, staff and me with her organizational and communication skills,” Dean Charles Bierbauer said. “She took on the interim role at a significant time when the school was making major change, including moving this past summer to new facilities in the heart of campus.”

Tanner received her undergraduate degree from the University of Georgia and her master’s and Ph.D. from UofSC. She has been on the faculty of the School of Journalism and Mass Communications since 2000. She is a former television reporter, anchor and producer.  Her research centers on the communication of health information through the media.

Tanner is active in the national Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication’s Communicating Science, Health, Environment and Risk Division, formerly serving as chair of the interest group.

The School of Journalism and Mass Communications has some 1,500 undergraduate students studying journalism, public relations, advertising, visual communications and mass communications. The school also offers master’s and doctoral degrees and has approximately 70 graduate students.  There are nearly 40 full-time faculty members. Since July, the school has been located in a 55,000-square-foot building that was fully renovated and enlarged at Sumter and Greene streets, adjacent to the university’s historic Horseshoe.

Tanner’s appointment as director of the school is the result of a national search and is effective immediately. She will also serve as an associate dean in the College of Information and Communications where the journalism school is administratively located.