Shawn Turner, national security and communication expert, has joined the College of Communication Arts and Sciences and the Strategic Communication Online Master’s Program as a professor of strategic communication.
“As I embark on this new phase of my career, there’s no place I would rather be than here at MSU in the College of Communication Arts and Sciences,” Turner said. “Opportunities like this are rare, so I'm looking forward to digging in and contributing to all the great work already being done here.”
Highlights from his extensive 30-year career include being an on-air analyst for CNN, deputy White House press secretary from 2014 to 2015, author, adjunct faculty for the University Pennsylvania School of Law and public affairs officer and combat correspondent for the U.S. Marine Corps.
To ComArtSci, he’ll bring areas of expertise in disinformation campaigns, crisis communication, the role of communication in national security, media training and communication theory. Turner will be teaching MSU StratCom courses and supporting director Jason Archer in expanding the program. Additionally, he will be an adjunct faculty in the Department of Communication and work on college-level initiatives focused on collaboration and leadership.
Turner and his wife, Monique Turner, both have positions at ComArtSci. Monique was named Chair of the Department of Communication earlier this year. She began her term in June.
“As a long-time communication practitioner and the spouse of a ComArtSci graduate, I've always known that this college had a stellar reputation,” Turner said. “A big part of that reputation, and certainly part of the reason that I'm here, is because in ComArtSci, there is a collective sense that college is and should be so much more than what happens in the classroom.
“Students here learn to work together and function as a community. They learn the importance of listening to and respecting people with different backgrounds, lifestyles, religious and ideological beliefs. And they learn to use the power of communication to do good work in the world. We need more of that, and I'm excited to be at a place where that's the goal.”