FORA.tv Speaker - Rachel Davis Mersey

Rachel Davis Mersey joined the Medill faculty in 2008 as an assistant professor of journalism with a specialization in audience understanding. The consistent focus of her work is on the craft of journalism. She is intrigued, in particular, by journalism's impact on sense of community, civic participation, and social capital.

She believes that these relationships deserve to be understood in a manner that can enhance professional decision-making when it comes to new product development and ongoing news management. Her aim is to improve the practice of journalism in a manner that enhances news operations' connections with their communities. Additionally, working to master the evolution of these constructs advances scholarship related to social identity theory, social networking theory, and psychological sense of community.

Before coming to Medill, she was on the faculty at the University of Minnesota’s School of Journalism and Mass Communication, where she was an affiliate faculty member of political psychology. She also worked at The Arizona Republic in Phoenix where she was part of the news team that launched the newspaper’s weekly tabloid targeting women 18 to 34. In addition, she worked across platforms with azcentral.com and the local NBC-affiliate.

She earned her Ph.D. from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill’s School of Journalism and Mass Communication in 2007. Her advisers were Philip Meyer and Rhonda Gibson, Ph.D.