Michael Rozansky has worked as an editor, writer and reporter for 30 years. Before joining the Annenberg Public Policy Center as director of communications, he spent more than 20 years at the Philadelphia Inquirer, most recently supervising its arts and entertainment coverage. He has reported on the arts, media, business, politics, national and regulatory issues. Rozansky also developed and taught a class at Temple University on the history and practice of celebrity journalism. He received a bachelor’s degree in English and American literature from Brown University and a master’s degree in journalism from Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism.
Television station KUSA in Denver, Colo., has won the 2015 Cronkite/Jackson Prize for Fact Checking Political Messages, named for the founding director of FactCheck.org, Brooks Jackson. The fact-checking award was selected by a jury convened by the Annenberg Public Policy Center, home of FactCheck.org.
The Rendell Center for Civics & Civic Engagement has moved its headquarters to the Annenberg Public Policy Center of the University of Pennsylvania, and the two institutions announced plans to collaborate on projects to strengthen civics education in schools.
Annenberg Classroom’s That’s Your Right game has been named a finalist for a 2015 Games for Change Award. The game, a single- or multiplayer digital card game that teaches students about the first 10 Amendments to the U.S. Constitution, was named one of the three finalists for Best Gameplay.
The political spin that so often is attached to discussions surrounding public policy and science is the focus of the March 2015 issue of the ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science. Politics and science often intermix on matters including climate change, vaccinations, fracking, nuclear power, evolution, genetically modified organisms, and stem cell research, among others.
In Quarterly Journal of Speech, Kathleen Hall Jamieson writes: "After arguing that our disciplinary origins and aptitudes equip us to understand the practice and potential of political debate, this essay will synthesize briefly some of the contributions our scholarship has made to understanding televised presidential debates..."
What would the 1864 presidential campaign have looked like if Abe Lincoln and Gen. George B. McClellan had used today’s deceptive campaign techniques and video attack ads? Lincoln was reelected 150 years ago on Nov. 8, and his campaign against McClellan has been reimagined by the political literacy website FlackCheck.org through a video timeline of ads that use humor, parody, and contemporary deceptive approaches.
Parents can become desensitized to violence and sex in movies after watching only a few scenes with disturbing content, according to a new study published in Pediatrics that was conducted by researchers at the Annenberg Public Policy Center. The study comes as scenes of sex and violence become more prevalent in movies aimed at youth. A 2013 study in Pediatrics from APPC researchers showed that the amount of violence in PG-13 movies tripled in the most popular movies since 1985.
To mark its 20th anniversary, the Annenberg Public Policy Center of the University of Pennsylvania is opening a new area of study, the Science of Science Communication, to investigate how scientific evidence can be more effectively conveyed to the public. APPC also announced that FactCheck.org, which has focused on political speech, has received funding from the Stanton Foundation to expand its mission to include monitoring the use and misuse of scientific evidence.
Scientists can minimize the likelihood that their message will be rejected in a politically polarized environment by avoiding advocacy, relying on trusted sources, and inviting the audience to understand the evidence that justifies the scientific conclusion, according to a new study by Annenberg Public Policy Center researchers published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. It showed that conservatives were able to draw the correct inferences about the downward trend in the Arctic sea ice despite exposure to a misleading Fox News report.
Rhode Island Gov. Lincoln D. Chafee met with students and faculty at the Annenberg School for Communication on Thursday, Oct. 2, and spoke about navigating an increasingly polarized political environment. Chafee, who has been Governor since 2011, previously served as a Republican U.S. Senator representing Rhode Island from 1999-2007. He subsequently became an Independent, and in 2013 announced that he would register as a Democrat.