CBS News veteran is latest Reynolds Visiting Professor
Tom Mattesky ’74, an Emmy-winning television journalist who oversaw the daily newsgathering efforts of CBS News in Washington for 12 years, will join the Department of Journalism and Mass Communications in January as its latest Donald W. Reynolds Distinguished Visiting Professor.
Mattesky will teach a course in the 12-week Winter Term entitled “Saving Television News.” He will also help direct students in the department’s converged reporting and producing classes, and help oversee the weekly Rockbridge Report television broadcast and multimedia Web site.
Mattesky’s professorship is made possible by a grant from the Donald W. Reynolds Foundation.
“I’m delighted that Tom will be with us for an entire semester,” said Department Head Brian Richardson ’73. “In one sense it will seem very familiar. Tom and I produced news in the department as students 35 years ago.
“But while the fundamentals of doing news responsibly have not changed, so much about the process has, and Tom is uniquely qualified to help our students understand that,” Richardson said.
As deputy Washington Bureau chief from 1995 until his retirement in 2007, Mattesky managed a staff of nearly 200 correspondents, producers and technicians, overseeing daily coverage of the White House, Capitol Hill, the Pentagon and the Supreme Court for one of the world’s premier broadcast news organizations.
Before that he spent two years as a producer for CBS News’ “Eye on America” segment. He also spent four years as the network’s chief White House producer during the administrations of George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton. He has worked with correspondents including Dan Rather, Lesley Stahl and Bob Schieffer. He also spent four years as a field producer based in Charlotte, N.C. and Atlanta, and also worked for network affiliates in Charlotte and Roanoke. He spent one year after graduation with a newspaper in Carlisle, Pa.
Mattesky won an Emmy in 1987 for investigative reporting for stories exposing problems with the nation’s medical helicopter programs.
Mattesky’s Winter Term course will put students in the middle of the debate about how to save television news as viewers abandon traditional newscasts and revenues shrink. The course content will include some of the journalistic, technological and marketing strategies being considered to keep television news viable.