Department Under New Management

The Department of Communications will soon be “under new management.”
Dr. Wendell Crow, who has served as department chair for the past nine years, will retire at the end of the 2005-06 academic year after 29 years of service at CSUF. Dr. Tony Fellow, current head of the journalism concentration, will succeed Crow when he takes over as chair at the end of the summer.

During Crow’s tenure, the department experienced significant growth and development. The number of majors increased 30 percent to approximately 2,400; a new concentration in entertainment studies was formalized; a collaborative graduate program in Hong Kong was added, as well as full major offerings at the Irvine Campus; ten full-time faculty members joined the department; and the number of part-time faculty doubled.
(Anthony A. Fellow)

Annual faculty retreats and awards banquets also were re-introduced.
Crow plans to spend his retirement writing, consulting and pursuing family and extracurricular interests. “I’ll miss the collegiality of the faculty, administrators and staff, working with our students, and being part of a great educational setting,” he said.
(Wendell C. Crow)

As incoming chair, Fellow is looking forward to building on the foundation laid by Crow and navigating the department successfully into the future. “I am a big picture person who likes to put the best people in charge and then provide the leadership to make things happen,” he explained. As part of his goals, Fellow hopes to develop interdisciplinary graduate programs, expand the department’s offerings in international programs, and build greater name recognition for the department.