Mohammed AL-Abdulla 

4/1/13                                                           Dotty Hamilton

                                                                                                                                            

            Today at Avila University, we are meeting with the Dean for the Communication Building. Her name is Dotty Hamilton. The interview with her was really interesting. I first asked her about her general background.

She grew up in Kansas City and went to the University of Missouri, and then she moved to Florida. She started to work in television news while she was in Florida. Because of that, she became interested in film. She did some documentaries and some environmental reports that were long-term documentaries. She went to CNN as a news producer.

            She then returned back to Florida to work in the Florida Wild Life Federation to produce environmental life documentaries. Because of that she became interested in film. She then moved back to Florida with her family. She had two twin boys. She stepped back from the work force for a while and went back to Kansas City, and went back to gradate school while the boys were little. She was doing some freelance writing. and saw the job at Avila open up in the communication department, so she thought it would be interesting to back to the academic side of things. She had her Masters degree during that time, but then went to KU to get her Doctorate degree in film studies in both production and film theory history. She began teaching at Avila, and has been there for 20 years. This has been a really exciting time because there have been a lot of changes in the program since that time. When she first got there, they only had one editing station. It was called Linear Editing Station, which a lot people do not know about. That is how she learned how to edit back at the television station.

            Her plan for Avila’s future is to see both the Communication and Liberal Arts departments growing. The faculty is doing wonderful things. Avila has great students and wants to see more students. There are lots recognitions of what the students are doing. There is a lot of energy and lots of exciting things to do here.

            Her future plan is to combine her interest in various academic subjects with travel, and she is continuing to do that. She is also teaching at the University of Paichen, Hungary. She is planning to continue with and the she and Eric Winter are working on a food culture class, and they will
be traveling to South Korea. She is really excited about that and would love to learn how to speak Korean for a variety of other reasons. She wants to giver her students opportunities to take classes and travel. This is something that she is really very passionate about