Hubbard School Administration & Leadership
María Elizabeth Len-Ríos, Interim Director
Professor, Cowles Endowed Professor of Media Management and Economics
Dr. María E. Len-Ríos (Ph.D., Missouri) joined the Hubbard School as professor and associate director after serving as the associate dean for academic affairs and a professor of public relations at the College of Journalism & Mass Communication at the University of Georgia. Len-Ríos conducts research in the areas of public relations, journalism, health communication and their influence on media professions and public culture. The third edition of her co-authored textbook Cross-Cultural Journalism and Strategic Communication: Storytelling and Diversity will be published in the fall of 2026 by Routledge (U.K.). She has won more than 10 top paper awards at regional, national and international academic conferences, published numerous journal articles with colleagues and has served in various roles on large and small grant projects. She is in her second term as a member of the Page Up Operating Committee and has served in leadership positions in other national and international journalism and communication higher education associations.
For appointments, please contact Emma Steiler, executive office assistant, at [email protected] or call 612-625-1338.
Emily Vraga, Interim Associate Director for Faculty and Administration
Professor, Don & Carole Larson Professorship in Health Communication
Emily Vraga holds the Don and Carole Larson Professorship in Health Communication. Her research focuses on how individuals respond to news and information about contentious health, scientific, and political issues in digital environments. Vraga studies how to (1) detect and correct misinformation via social media, especially on health and political topics, (2) use news media literacy messages to limit biased processing and improve information consumption habits, (3) encourage attention to higher quality and more diverse online content. She prioritizes using diverse and novel research methods — including experiments, surveys, content analysis, and qualitative interviews — to better match an evolving hybrid media environment.
Contact Emily Vraga at [email protected]
Matt Carlson, Director of Graduate Studies
Professor, Cowles Fellow in Journalism
As a journalism studies scholar focused on what is happening to news in a changing media environment, Matt Carlson concentrates his research primarily on how different actors publicly compete to define journalism and its boundaries, dictate its normative and ethical commitments, and establish proper forms of news—all of which has epistemic and political consequences for society. Carlson's research program advances conceptual tools to make sense of these processes, including journalistic authority, metajournalistic discourse, and boundary work.
Contact Matt Carlson at [email protected]
Erich Sommerfeldt, Academic Director, Professional Master's in Strategic Communication
Dr. Erich Sommerfeldt received his Ph.D. in Mass Communication from the Gaylord School of Journalism and Mass Communication at the University of Oklahoma in 2011 and his M.A. in Communication from Western Michigan University in 2008. He specializes in public relations, with research emphases in civil society and development communication, public diplomacy, social capital, and social network analysis. He was selected in 2020 by the National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine and the U.S. Department of State as a Jefferson Science Fellow. He was appointed as a Senior Advisor to the State Department in 2022. He was recently elected as vice chair of the public relations division of the International Communication Association.
Contact Erich Sommerfeldt at [email protected]
Valérie Bélair-Gagnon, Director of Undergraduate Studies
Dr. Valérie Bélair-Gagnon is Associate Professor and Cowles Fellow in Media Management at the Hubbard School. She is also a Waldfogel Scholars of the College of Liberal Arts (2023-26) and McKnight Presidential Fellow (2022-2025) at the University of Minnesota. Her affiliations include: the Department of Communication as Oslo Metropolitan University, the Department of Sociology at the University of Minnesota and Yale Law School Information Society Project.
Contact Valérie Bélair-Gagnon at [email protected]
Carly Eichhorst, Chief of Staff
Carly Eichhorst has spent 20 years working within higher education across several roles in Enrollment, Financial Aid and Advancement. Her areas of expertise also include process mapping, design thinking and implementation analysis and her favorite part of her work is helping teams collaborate in new ways. Her undergraduate degree is in Studio Art, with a focus on Printmaking and she has an MPA from the Humphrey School of Public Affairs at the University of Minnesota.
Contact Carly at [email protected]
Colleen Baker, Assistant Director of Curriculum and Instruction
Colleen earned a Master's Degree in Curriculum and Instruction from the University of Kansas. Prior to joining the University of Minnesota, she served as the Academic Dean of Mathematics for the San Antonio Independent School District, Texas. She specializes in curriculum development and instructional coaching.
Contact Colleen at [email protected]
Rebecca Rassier, Associate Director of Student Services
Rebecca earned a Ph.D. in French from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. She has worked in student services in the College of Liberal Arts at the University of Minnesota since 2000 and has received the John Tate Award for Excellence in Academic Advising and both the group and individual Outstanding Service Award in the College of Liberal Arts. Rebecca directs student services for the School of Journalism and Mass Communication, which includes curriculum management, advising, programming, policy, recruitment/promotion, admissions, scholarships, and instruction/conduct concerns.
Contact Rebecca Rassier at [email protected]