Prof elected president of international communication organization

Patrice Buzzanell, a professor of communication, begins her six-year term with the International Communication Association this spring. She is the first Purdue professor to be elected president to this research-oriented organization that has more than 3,500 members in 65 countries.

Buzzanell is known for her research in career, leadership and gender issues, especially in mothering, maternity and work-family management. Her most recent work looks at fathers.

Buzzanell is responsible for planning the association's 2007 annual conference and participating in other administrative duties. Buzzanell officially becomes president at the end of the May 2008 conference in Montreal, and as a past president she will serve three more years on various committees and chair the finance board during the last year of her term.

"This appointment certainly means increased visibility for the Department of Communication's quality programs and its commitment to an international agenda for the field," Buzzanell said. "Purdue's communication department has a strong reputation, but now this position is going to draw more attention to our program and excellent faculty, research and students. I am really excited about promoting our tradition and highlighting how we are evolving in such innovative ways."

The Department of Communication is housed in the College of Liberal Arts, and is composed of six areas: health communication; interpersonal communication; organizational communication; public relations/issue management; rhetorical studies; and media, technology and society.

Three programs in the department are ranked among the top 10 in the United States by the nation's largest communication association. The department's graduate program was ranked fourth in interpersonal communication and seventh and eighth in organizational and health communication, respectively, by the National Communication Association in 2004. The association ranks programs every three years.

Buzzanell earned her doctorate degree in organizational communication from Purdue in 1987, her master's degree from Ohio University in 1978 and her bachelor's of science from Towson University in Maryland in 1975. Since 2000, she has served as a faculty team adviser for the Engineering Projects in Community Service (EPICS), a program that encourages undergraduate students to use technology and science to benefit the community.

Media contact: Maggie Morris, (765) 494-2432, maggiemorris@purdue.edu

Source: Patrice Buzzanell, (765) 494-3317, buzzanel@purdue.edu

Purdue News Service: (765) 494-2096; purduenews@purdue.edu

Related Web sites:
Purdue Department of Communication: http://www.cla.purdue.edu/communication/

International Communication Association: http://www.icahdq.org/

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