Media School marks one year in Franklin Hall
One year has passed since The Media School made its home in Franklin Hall, then a 109-year-old building in the Old Crescent that had just completed a $21 million renovation.
Since then, a fall, spring and summer semester have come and gone. Franklin Hall hosted classes, events and visitors from all over the world. Students studied, created media and graduated.
Here are some of the highlights.
July 25, 2016: The move begins. Furniture and equipment is packed up from the Radio and Television Building, Ernie Pyle Hall and the Classroom Office Building and unloaded at Franklin Hall.
Aug. 22, 2016: The Media School holds its first day of classes in Franklin Hall.
Sept. 15, 2016: Academic advisors move to Franklin Hall. The five staff members started the year in the Radio and Television Building because water issues in the advising suite necessitated further renovation.
Sept. 27, 2016: IU formally rededicates Franklin Hall as the home of The Media School. President Michael McRobbie, members of the IU Board of Trustees and other campus dignitaries participate in the ceremony. Fox broadcaster Joe Buck, who attended IU in the late ’80s and early ’90s, spoke at the ceremony and received an honorary doctorate.
Oct. 9, 2016: The IU Cinema screens a trio of films chosen by McRobbie in honor of The Media School’s move to Franklin Hall: A Year of Living Dangerously, The Lost Honor of Katharina Blum and Z.
Nov. 4, 2016: The Media School hosts its annual Media Career Day in Franklin Hall for the first time. More than 25 alumni present career advice in nine panel discussions, networking sessions and one-on-one chats with students.
Nov. 5, 2016: The Media School hosts its annual Distinguished Alumni Awards in Journalism. The ceremony honors alumni Kenneth A. Beckley, BS’62; Bonnie J. Brownlee, BA’72, MA’75; Eric Deggans, BA’90; Andy Hall, BA’82; and Bob Shanks, BS’54.
Nov. 8, 2016: Franklin Hall serves as the campus’s “election night central.” Three discussion panels debate topics related to media and politics, and guests watch live election returns on the commons’s 24-foot-by-12-foot screen. WIUX, IU’s student radio station, and PBS affiliate WTIU broadcast live from the commons.
Dec. 9, 2016: Game designers from across the country and from Canada travel to Franklin Hall to serve as judges for Game Workshop II’s live game pitch competition in the commons. Student teams display game prototypes on the commons screen, and judges make the final call on which games will move on to production and which won’t.
Dec. 16, 2016: December graduates become the first students to walk across the stage in Franklin Hall for The Media School’s commencement celebration.
January 2017: The Media School outfits room 052 with high-end gaming and development PCs, the fastest machines in any lab on campus. The upgrade includes 10 HTC VIVE virtual reality kits.
Jan. 20, 2017: Franklin Hall serves as one of 600 local hosts for the Global Game Jam. Forty-four game designers — both students and local residents — gather in the game design lab to create games based on a common theme: waves.
Jan. 31, 2017: The Media School renames its state-of-the-art television control room the Ed Spray Control Room in honor of alumnus Ed Spray, BS’63, who made a donation to The Media School’s Franklin Hall Fund. Spray is the former president of Scripps Networks.
Feb. 2, 2017: The Media School installs a motion capture system in The Beckley Studio. The technology allows student filmmakers and game designers to animate digital character models based on recorded actions of human actors.
Feb. 15, 2017: The Media School participates in China Remixed: Arts and Humanities in Contemporary Chinese Culture, a campus-wide festival of arts in contemporary Chinese culture. The commons screen displays a video art exhibition showcasing Chinese video artwork daily for three weeks.
Feb. 26, 2017: The Media School’s Graduate Student Association rolls out a red carpet to host Oscar night. Panelists discuss everything from predicted winners to #OscarsSoWhite — broadcast on Facebook Live in the Beckley Studio — and guests watch the event live on the commons screen.
April 7, 2017: Franklin Hall is the site of The Media School’s first Graduate Student Conference, themed “Finding Common Ground.”
May 14, 2017: Thirty young filmmakers from India and Pakistan spend three weeks in Franklin Hall creating films on Southern Indiana for Beyond Borders: A Workshop on Filmmaking Across the Punjab Region. The project is a collaboration between The Media School and IU’s Office of International Development.
June 13, 2017: More than 40 middle and high school students participate in The Media School’s Game Development Camp, held in Franklin Hall for the first time.
July 10, 2017: The 71-year-old High School Journalism Institute holds workshops in Franklin Hall for the first time.
July 17, 2017: WIUX, IU’s student radio station, moves into Franklin Hall, bringing all student-run media together.