University Distinguished Professor Emerita Sandi Smith has been awarded the Robert F. Banks Award for Institutional Leadership, one of Michigan State University’s prestigious All-University Awards. This honor recognizes exceptional faculty members whose leadership has strengthened MSU’s core mission through lasting contributions to academic excellence, faculty development and institutional growth.
Valuing Mentorship and Collaboration
For Smith, this recognition carries particular significance. Early in her career, she was mentored by the award’s namesake, the late Professor Robert Banks, as well as Professor Nancy Pogel, who both played a role in shaping Smith’s academic trajectory.
“When I came to MSU, I was selected to go on a three-day ‘Meet Michigan’ bus trip for faculty and administrators,” Smith said, noting the program’s similarity to the Spartan Bus Tour. “Robert Banks and Nancy Pogel were the lead administrators on the trip. We covered a lot of Michigan and saw first-hand the great impact of our land-grant initiatives. We also met people across the university, and we were able to establish relationships outside of our own departments and colleges.”
Through the Lilly Teaching Fellows Program and the Meet Michigan tour — programs led by Banks and Pogel — the California native developed a passion for collaboration that has guided her throughout her career. They were the steppingstones for her later interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary research efforts.
The relationships Smith has built through collaborative projects have served the greater good on countless occasions, mitigating the silos of academia in favor of more meaningful results. While thoroughly surprised to receive the Robert F. Banks Award, Smith expressed deep appreciation for the educators who influenced her career.
“Bob and Nancy were certainly early mentors of mine, and it is such an honor to receive an award named for Bob.”
A Legacy of Leadership and Service
Smith’s leadership has also had a profound impact on ComArtSci. As a mentor, Smith has personally advised more than 80 master’s and doctoral students and provided guidance for numerous faculty members, empowering them each to excel in their research and teaching endeavors.
Crediting the Department of Communication’s long-standing tradition of working in research teams, Smith notes that this practice lends itself well to creating a familial atmosphere — while also setting the stage for an apprenticeship system, in which the more advanced graduate students take newcomers under their wings. Occasionally, Smith was even able to collaborate with her late husband and fellow University Distinguished Professor, Charles Atkin.
“My legacy will be in the careers and lives of my students and fellow faculty with whom I have worked,” she said. “The Department of Communication will continue to be a family with an excellent reputation.”
A Career of Impact
Widely cited and recognized at the national and international level, Smith’s research in health communication, interpersonal communication, and persuasion and social influence has both shaped academic discourse and influenced public understanding — bridging the gap between theory and real-world impact.
One such example is the Breast Cancer and the Environment project, a multimillion-dollar Center Grant partnership with the Department of Biology and health advocacy groups funded by National Institutes of Health (National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences and National Cancer Institute).
“It was rewarding to work with the four other centers in the U.S. as biologists and epidemiologists studied possible environmental contaminants that could contribute to breast cancer,” Smith said. “Our job was to disseminate the findings to the public and to work with breast cancer advocates. We are now seeing this knowledge to be widespread in our society, and I find that to be very rewarding.”
Smith’s ability to collaborate across disciplines has amplified the reach of her work, enhancing MSU’s prominence as a hub for innovative communication scholarship. She is currently finishing up another impactful project that has spanned more than a decade — a partnership with Professor Merry Morash in the School of Criminal Justice and Professor Amanda Holmstrom in the Department of Communication, among others.
“Merry and I were talking about how our areas might intersect, and we decided that it would be a good idea to determine they ways in which parole and probation agents communicate with their clients that are particularly effective in helping them improve their lives,” Smith explained.
The project, led by Morash, was initially funded by the MSU Foundation. Smith notes that this led to three different NSF grants and many important findings to improve the process of probation and parole. “[Morash] had all the expertise, and she had the important connections with the Department of Corrections. I was able to bring the communication focus into the project” Smith said. The pair eventually taught a Ph.D. level graduate class together where they merged the two disciplines.
Celebrating Smith’s Lasting Influence
Throughout her career as a Spartan, Sandi Smith served on 37 college and university level committees (and at least 160 Ph.D. and M.A. committees). She officially retired from Michigan State University in 2023, though Smith remains highly active in the academic community. Aside from continued support for her graduate students, analyzing research data and writing journal articles, Smith also continues to support “The Ducks” — MSU’s social norms campaign promoting responsible alcohol consumption that she has been involved with since its conception.
As ComArtSci celebrates this well-deserved recognition, Smith’s contributions remind us of the transformative power of dedicated institutional leadership and strong research support. Smith’s values of fostering a collaborative academic culture extend beyond ComArtSci, contributing to initiatives that have elevated MSU’s reputation as a leader in communication scholarship and transdisciplinary engagement.
“Over the years it seems like ... a lot of my career was just pure serendipity and the fact that Michigan State has so many opportunities. You can always find some place that you can be of service as a Spartan.”
By Jessica Mussell
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Sandi Smith Research Fellowship