News Story

The Media School Alumni Board is honoring seven fellow alumni who have excelled across media fields as recipients of its 2024 Distinguished Alumni Awards.

The school will celebrate their contributions to the news and media industries at a ceremony on Nov. 15 in Franklin Hall.

The recipients are:

Elizabeth Bernstein, BA’87

Over her rich, 20-year career at The Wall Street Journal, Elizabeth Bernstein has reported on higher education, philanthropy, psychology, and religion. Her work has ranged far and wide, from exposing the backlash against excessive emailing of baby photos to a detailed narrative reconstruction of a matricide. Bernstein has been recognized by many organizations, and in 2009, she and a colleague won first-place awards from the New York News Publishers Association and Mental Health America for their story, “A Death in the Family.” Bernstein also received a Distinguished Column Writing Award of Excellence in 2010. As a columnist for the WSJ, Bernstein writes about social psychology and the manifold aspects of human interactions.

Lillian R. Dunlap, PhD’92

Lillian Dunlap has spent her career at the intersection of teaching and storytelling – training thousands of college students, professional journalists, and journalism faculty – and using storytelling as a tool to foster organizational cultures of diversity and inclusion. She is principal and CEO of Communication Research Enterprises and executive director of Your Real Stories Inc., a nonprofit theatrical journalism company. Her production credits include senior consultant to PBS’ award-winning documentary, “Eyes on the Prize II,” a series chronicling the Civil Rights movement from 1962-1985, and associate producer for several WTIU programs while she was at IU. Through Your Real Stories Inc., she produces “The Your Real Stories Show” on GrioTV and has created award-winning theatrical performances. Dunlap co-created and directs an annual storytelling festival, Story Days in Tampa Bay.

Fred Kalil, BA’04

Fred Kalil became an Atlanta icon over the course of the 31 years he spent as a sports broadcaster in the nation’s 10th-largest market, thanks to his affable personality and encyclopedic sports knowledge. After working in West Virginia, Ohio, Arizona, and Indiana, Kalil landed in Atlanta as the sports director of the NBC affiliate WXIA-TV 11Alive News, where he spent 23 years. He reported on every major sporting event in the region, including the Summer Olympics, and pioneered coverage of multiple Friday night high school football games at once. In 2015, Kalil was named the sports director at CBS46, the Atlanta CBS affiliate. Kalil has won 14 southeast Emmys for Best Sportscaster and was named Georgia Sports Caster of the Year four times. He was inducted into the Atlanta Press Club Hall of Fame in 2017. After a 44-year career in sports broadcasting, he retired in April 2023.

Mike Kelley, BA’89

Mike Kelley is an award-winning television writer, producer, and creator. Starting his professional career working as a production assistant in Los Angeles, he has gone on to write and produce hundreds of episodes of TV beginning in the late 90s, including NBC’s “Providence,” The CW’s “One Tree Hill,” Fox’s “The OC,” and CBS’s “Jericho.” He created his first solo series in 2008, the well-received 1970s-era drama “Swingtown” for CBS. In 2011, he created Disney/ABC’s international hit and Golden Globe-nominated “Revenge,” and in 2019, he created Netflix’s soapy thriller “WHAT/IF.” He simultaneously worked as an executive producer for the award-winning series “David Makes Man” alongside Oprah Winfrey and Michael B. Jordan. Kelley has been nominated for several awards, including the Teen Choice Awards, People’s Choice Awards, and Golden Globe Awards.

Holly Gooding Miller, BA’64

In a career spanning 50 years, Holly Gooding Miller has held roles as a reporter, managing editor, corporate speechwriter, textbook author, guest lecturer, college professor, and publications consultant. She was the first female general-assignment reporter hired by the Anderson (Indiana) Herald, the daily newspaper she later led as managing editor. Miller moved to The Saturday Evening Post magazine to work on profile and travel articles, and she later began freelancing for various magazines. Miller’s work has received recognition from several organizations, including the Associated Press, the Society of American Travel Writers, the Midwest Travel Writers Association, and more. Miller was inducted into Ball State University’s Journalism Hall of Fame and honored with BSU’s Journalism Alumni Award and Distinguished Alumni Award.

Derek Mobley, BA’91

Derek Mobley has shaped the viewing of three decades of major sporting events, including Rose Bowls, Wimbledons, Olympics, and many more. He began his 34-year career at ESPN in 1990 and has risen to be one of the top directors in sports television, including a six-time Sports Emmy Awards winner and 42-time nominee. While at ESPN, Mobley has run productions on 15 properties, and, as director of ABC’s Saturday Night Football package, the majority of ESPN’s marquee regular-season college football games since 2006. He is currently in his second season as the director of “Monday Night Football.” Mobley is also a member of the Directors Guild of America and is a two-time SVG Sports Media Award winner.

Matthew Tully, BA’92

The late Matthew Tully was an award-winning reporter and columnist for The Indianapolis Star who built a reputation as a fair-minded but rigorous commentator who created a remarkable body of work. After reporting on the U.S. Senate in Washington, D.C., for Congressional Quarterly, Tully returned to Indiana to work as a reporter with the IndyStar, writing nearly 2,000 columns. In 2005, he became the Star’s political columnist, a role that would define his career and cement his rank among the best journalists in Indiana. In 2009, Tully began a series of columns called “The Manual Project,” reporting on the complex challenges facing Manual High School. The series inspired an initiative now called Our Children, which helps fund charity organizations targeted at youth. Tully was inducted into the Indiana Journalism Hall of Fame in 2019.