From winning writing awards and teaching awards to working in the professional world, Professor Martell’s road to teaching at SJMC was long and winding and filled with a plethora of experience. 

Through the first 15 years of her career, Professor Martell worked as a reporter and copyeditor in the newspaper industry. The topics she covered ranged from government, business, healthcare and higher education. Being able to see the ins and outs of the industry provided her with valuable experience – an important perspective she can offer to her students. 

After working in the professional world for some time, Professor Martell decided to make the switch over to teaching and was happy to accept a job at Friends University in Wichita, Kansas.

 “I had always wanted to teach at the college level,” Professor Martell said. “That had been the goal behind getting a master’s degree. This was meeting a longtime goal. Something that I had wanted to do ever since I first went to college, I enjoyed classes and the college atmosphere so much.” 

While she always had a passion for teaching, it was here that she finally got to put it to action winning the Jan LaFever Memorial Adjunct Award for Excellence in Teaching award.

After her stint at Friends University, Professor Martell made a few more stops teaching at the University of Illinois and Augustana College. This allowed her to expand on her skills as an educator. 

The life-long Midwest native finally found a new home with the Iowa Hawkeyes and has been teaching here since 2016. 

Now in her fifth year as an associate professor, Professor Martell is teaching JMC:3410:0001 magazine reporting and writing in addition to JMC:2010 journalistic reporting and writing and JMC:3400 specialized reporting and writing.

Magazine reporting and writing is a class centered around web-based magazines and the different styles they may appear in. The class explores the depths and differences between various genres including a profile, analytical, how-to, issue, trend, or explanatory article. 

This year the class is composed of a magazine critique presentation and two major stories. The major stories have always been a part of the curriculum, but the magazine critique presentation is new this year.

“I have added a couple of twists of my own,” Professor Martell said. “The project helps students become familiar with the type of writing that a magazine-style publication would want to see, and aside from the magazine that the student’s review, we will continue to review publications all semester.”

While Professor Martell has never taught magazine reporting and writing before, she has a strong basis due to her experience as a free-lancer as well as teaching journalistic reporting and writing. The two classes are similar, however, journalistic reporting and writing is the base-level class whereas magazine reporting and writing goes into more depth and expects students to advance in their storytelling ability.

 “I expect the students to go beyond what they may have done for journalistic reporting and writing,” Professor Martell said. “Show that you can explore a topic in-depth, find the information that your audience would be most interested in, and write that information in a compelling way.”

Professor Martell also takes pride in giving as much feedback as she can. While it may appear intimidating at first, it isn’t meant to come across this way. It’s to help students learn from mistakes they made in previous assignments and grow as a writer.