About Youth Today - Directors

Leonard Witt

Leonard Witt holds the Robert D. Fowler Distinguished Chair in Communication at Kennesaw State University and was named an Eminent Scholar by the Board of Regents of the University System of Georgia in May 2008. In August 2008, he was awarded the Distinguished Service Award for Kennesaw State University. With generous funding from the Harnisch Foundation, he founded the Center for Sustainable Journalism at Kennesaw State University.

The Center’s mission is aimed at discovering innovative ways to produce financially sustainable, high quality and ethically sound journalism. The Center will produce applied research, build collaborations and advance innovative projects to test the viability of community-supported journalism. He was a journalist for more than 25 years, including being editor of Sunday Magazine at the Minneapolis Star Tribune and Minnesota Monthly magazine. Before entering academia in 2002, he was the executive director of the Minnesota Public Radio Civic Journalism Initiative. He blogs at PJNet.org.

Youth Today Staff

Vanessa Schill

Vanessa Schill is the Marketing Coordinator for the Center for Sustainable Journalism, Youth Today and the Juvenile Justice Information Exchange. In addition to ad sales, subscription and webinar cultivation, Vanessa also designs and builds marketing materials, print and web ads for Youth Today and JJIE.

Vanessa has more than 10 years of experience in media, ranging from editorial and reporting to advertising and publication design. In addition to her work at the Center, Vanessa is a freelance writer and public relations professional.

Vanessa is currently working toward her BS in Communication-Media Studies at Kennesaw State University. She lives in Kennesaw with her husband and three small dogs.

Carole Arnold

Carole Arnold is the Marketing and Logistics Manager for the Center for Sustainable Journalism and all of its projects, conferences and other endeavors. During her more than fifteen years of experience, she has developed a versatile skill set including marketing communications and project management.

Joining the CSJ in 2009, Carole has played an integral role in launching, developing and maintaining the strategic goals of the Center. Carole holds a Bachelor of Arts from University of South Florida in International Studies.

John Fleming

John Fleming has been in journalism for nearly 20 years.

His first experience in a newsroom was as a boy working at his mother’s weekly, The Geneva Reaper, in south Alabama. A graduate of The University of Alabama and the Columbia Graduate School of Journalism, Fleming went on to work as a foreign correspondent, a newspaper editor and an investigative reporter. While covering southern and west Africa for five years for a number of news outlets including Reuters, he reported on wars in Congo, Angola and Congo-Brazzaville, the rise of the anti-apartheid government and civil unrest in KwaZulu-Natal in South Africa, the U.N. intervention in Mozambique, the aftermath of the Rwandan genocide, ethnic warfare in Burundi, political repression in Zimbabwe, guerilla warfare in northern Uganda and Sudan as well as the oil and diamond trade throughout the region.

Later, while at The Anniston (Ala.) Star he worked as editorial page editor and then editor at large. There he directed an aggressive editorial team that covered state, national and international politics and economics while playing a crucial role in advancing the needs of a local community deeply in need.

His most recent work, in collaboration with colleagues from other news outlets, has been with the Civil Rights Cold Case Project, a groundbreaking investigative journalism project involving print, radio and documentary film. The Cold Case Project has examined many murders from the Civil Rights era that have in the past received little or no coverage from the press or interest from law enforcement.

Ryan Schill

Ryan Schill is a reporter with Youth Today.

A graduate of Kennesaw State University, Ryan holds a BS in Communication with a concentration in Media Studies. He is currently pursuing an MA in Professional Writing at KSU.

Originally from New Jersey, Ryan has lived in the Atlanta, Ga. area for more than a decade, first travelling south in a misbegotten road trip adventure that was marked by far too many naps on the side of the highway.

Ryan now lives in Kennesaw, Ga. with his wife, Vanessa, and two small dogs. When he is not writing for JJIE, Ryan freelances for print and online magazines as well as practicing his web design skills on his website, ryanschill.com.

Clay Duda

Clay Duda is a Digital Media Specialist (DMS) with the Center for Sustainable Journalism (CSJ), JJIE’s parent company. As DMS, Clay oversees virtually all multimedia projects for the CSJ and the JJIE while maintaining the organizations online presence and working in the JJIE newsroom.

Clay splits his time between the CSJ’s Digital Communications department and the JJIE newsroom. While much of his work is behind the scenes, you’ll find his bylines, photos and other work appearing regularly on the JJIE and other sites associated with the Center.

A 2010 graduate from Georgia State University, Clay holds a BA in Journalism with a minor in fine art photography. As an undergrad, he worked as an investigative reporter and editor with student news organization, served as Music Intern at Creative Loafing in Atlanta and tackled a variety of freelance gigs – all while maintaining a 3.7 GPA and working full-time.

Aside from his work with the JJIE and CSJ, Clay freelances on a semi-regular basis for a handful of regional and national (thanks to the power of the internets) publications. He blogs spastically at www.clayduda.com and takes a lot of pictures with his iPhone, most of which never see the light of day.

Jen Renshaw

Jen Renshaw has over 20 years of experience in operations, infrastructure and program design, curriculum and training plan development, product marketing and product launch. She has worked in a variety of industries including education, health & human services, advertising, and consumer products in the U.S. and abroad and has worked in both for-profit and not-for-profit organizations.

In addition to her work at the Center for Sustainable Journalism, Jen is a freelance business development and marketing consultant for entrepreneurs and start ups and is actively involved with several promising new ventures in both the for-profit and not-for-profit sectors.

Jen has spent a good part of her career working in higher education. Prior to coming to the Kennesaw State University, Jen served for 8 years as the Associate Director at the Lang Center for Entrepreneurship at Columbia Business School in New York City. Jen holds an MBA with concentrations in Entrepreneurship and Marketing from Kennesaw State University and a BFA in Theater Performance from Indiana University of Pennsylvania.

A Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania native, Jen now lives in Roswell, Georgia with husband and two children.