| Communication Week
Communication Week is a entire week of events dedicated to bringing together students from every part of the Communication Department: Communication Studies, Broadcast Journalism, Advertising/Public Relations, Broadcast Media and Graduate students. Mixers, competitions and student showcase make up parts of Comm Week, but the students and faculty also focus on campus awareness by bringing a guest lecturer to WTAMU. In 2009, director of Hollywood, Health & Society (HH&S), Sandra de Castro Buffington, spoke about her program that provides entertainment industry professionals with accurate and timely information for health storylines. In 2010, author, educator and filmaker Jackson Katz spoke on the topic of gender violence prevention, and his new book "The Macho Paradox." The 2011 communication scholar, Jean Kilbourne, presented her groundbreaking study on the image of women in advertising, a lecture made famous by her documentary film Killing Us Softly. Last year, WTAMU hosted guest presenter Liz Murray who was the subject of Lifetime TV's Emmy nominated original film Homeless to Harvard as well as the author of the New York Times best selling book "Breaking Night." This year, WTAMU is pleased to present Betty Nguyen as a portion of the Distinguished Lecture Series.  Betty Nguyen is an award-winning journalist whose work has taken her across the globe. She worked at CBS News (2010 - 2012) as an anchor and correspondent, contributing to the network’s broadcasts and platforms, including The CBS Morning News and The Early Show. She has interviewed some of the most important newsmakers and celebrities of our time including the Dalai Lama, President George W. Bush, Senator Ted Kennedy, Lenny Kravitz, Willie Nelson, Dolly Parton, Usher, Michael Douglas and Christian Louboutin, among many others.
Before joining CBS News, Nguyen served as anchor of the weekend morning edition of CNN Newsroom. During this time, she anchored the network's coverage of major news events, including the earthquakes in Chile and Haiti in 2010, Pope Benedict XVI's first papal visit to the United States in 2008, the Virginia Tech shooting in 2007, the death of Pope John Paul II in April 2005 and the London bombing attacks in July 2005. Nguyen also anchored portions of CNN's coverage of the tsunami disaster in South Asia, the Iraqi elections in January 2005 and the June 2004 handover of sovereignty to Iraq.
Nguyen traveled to Constitución, Mexico in 2009 to cover the damage caused by Hurricane Jimena. In 2008, she reported from Houston and Galveston, Texas during Hurricane Ike. Also that year, she went undercover in Myanmar for a series of exclusive reports that exposed a lack of aid after Cyclone Nargis killed more than 140,000 people. Nguyen traveled to Africa in 2007 to cover the presidential elections in Sierra Leone, the political and economic crises in Zimbabwe and apartheid-era prosecutions in South Africa.
In September 2005, Nguyen reported and anchored from the Houston Astrodome, where thousands sought shelter after Hurricane Katrina. Later that month, she went on assignment in her birth country of Vietnam to cover the deadly flooding caused by annual monsoons.
Before joining CNN, Nguyen was an anchor at KTVT-TV, the CBS affiliate in Dallas, where she covered numerous breaking news events, including the Space Shuttle Columbia disaster. She also served as a freelance correspondent for E! Entertainment Television during the 2003 California gubernatorial election. Nguyen began her career as a morning anchor and reporter at KWTX-TV, the CBS affiliate in Waco, Texas.
In 2007, the Smithsonian Institute recognized her as the first Vietnamese-American to anchor a national television news broadcast in the United States. In 2003, Nguyen won a regional Emmy Award for "Outstanding Noon Newscast," and received an Associated Press Award in 1998 for breaking news coverage.
She is also the co-founder of Help the Hungry, a non-profit organization that provides humanitarian aid to poverty-stricken families.
Nguyen graduated magna cum laude from the University of Texas at Austin with a bachelor's degree in broadcast journalism. In 2008, she received the Outstanding Young Texas Ex Award.
Information courtesy of washingtonspeakers.com.
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