Welcome to this week's edition of The People I Sort of Know podcast. I'm Chase Parm.

This week we're going to talk with Andrea Hickerson. She's the Ole Miss School of Journalism and New Media Dean. She's been on the job since July 1st, just starting her second semester here in Oxford. So we're going to talk a good bit about education, journalism education, the field of journalism, what's next, and much more. Also get her impressions of Ole Miss and the city of Oxford to this point.

She was previously at the University of South Carolina, where she was the director of their journalism and media department.

She was an associate dean there, and she spent a long time in Rochester, New York, as well on the faculty at RIT. So we're going to talk

with her here coming up on this edition of the show. Enjoy talking to her to this point and during

her time in Oxford. And we'll get to it now. So here is Andrea Hickerson, the dean for the

Old Miss School of Journalism and New Media. Andrea Higgerson now joining us. Thanks for the time today.

It's on a on a Friday as

just getting back in the session first week back in school. You had your first semester last year

after getting here. And in July, I guess to start here, what have you thought so far? Oxford

and what did you know about the school, the community? How did it sort of play up from the very beginning?

Sure. Yeah. Well, thank you for taking the time with me today to chat. It's been a great

first semester in Oxford and at Ole Miss. And like everybody says, once you get on campus,

it's hard to leave. So I'm approaching almost the year mark from when I interviewed on campus.

And, you know,

the number one thing that strikes me is what a creative space it is that I feel like here,

people are really collaborative and they want to get things done and they're really here to help people. And that's a really great space to be in. It's a lot of place where I'm looking to

maintain something. It's a place where we're looking to grow and make it constantly exciting. And the students are here for that. They are bringing that life to us and constantly pushing us to be better. And it's just been really great to be part of this community and the energy that it has. What does the process look like with taking a job like this? I mean, when you say a year ago when you interviewed or what

that looks like, how long of a process and how does it even come on your radar? Yeah, that's a good

question. So it is a long process. So in this case, sometimes universities use executive search

companies. And that was the case in this situation. And I thought, well, gee, that sounds really fun. I knew that they had a great history of doing journalism here. And so that was kind of the initial kind of stick your toe in. But also when I came here, it's really open-minded. I didn't know what I was going to find, right? And you're looking for a fit as well as to a program like this is a good match for me personally

and for this this group of people and i was really struck with how open everybody was on the interview

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