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You may notice—as we did while this issue was taking shape—how many of the stories center on images and representations. As you enjoy this copy of CMCI Now, I wonder if these stories might change your image of us.

To information science doctoral student Jordan Wirfs-Brock (MJour’10), data points on a graph and cascading notes on a piano can tell similar stories.

With smartphones and social media fueling a new era of video activism, Assistant Professor Sandra Ristovska says it’s time we give images their due respect.

"Design and advertising students fundamentally understand that creative outlets are important. But beyond doodling, beyond posting phone pics to Instagram, beyond occasionally journaling—a wholehearted investment in one’s own creativity will make a career of difference," writes Visiting Professor Jeff Curry.

The same qualities that draw student Hunter Rief to advertising—an ability to embrace spontaneity and delve into the unknown—are at the heart of his main extracurricular activity: bolting across Folsom field with one of America’s most famous buffaloes, CU �鶹ӰԺ’s Ralphie.

The 2018 Al Nakkula Award for Police Reporting went to The Virginian-Pilot reporter Gary Harki, whose series "Jailed in Crisis" tracked deaths of people with mental illness in jails across the country. Harki and reporter Rebecca Carballo––who helped him with the project as a student at Marquette University––spoke with CU News Corps Director Chuck Plunkett about their work for the series, and the need to track such instances more thoroughly.

As students in the Carnegie-Knight News21 fellowship program, Tessa Diestel (Jour'18) and Ashley Hopko (Jour'19) traveled the country investigating intolerance, racism and hate crimes. Their project, Hate in America, won the 2018 Edward R. Murrow Award for Excellence in Digital Reporting.

This year, Serene Singh became the first woman in university history and the first CU �鶹ӰԺ student in 25 years to earn a Rhodes Scholarship. In the fall, she'll head to Oxford University in England as part of a path she hopes could one day lead to a seat on the U.S. Supreme Court.

In Improv for Strategic Communication, taught by actor and improv aficionado Pat Finn, students learn the same games that he and other comedians—including Saturday Night Live alumni going back decades—play to prepare for the stage.