Michael Koliska is a 4th year Ph.D. student in the Philip Merrill College of Journalism.
COLLEGE PARK, Md. – Philip Merrill College of Journalism Ph.D. student Michael Koliska will be one of sixteen University of Maryland Graduate School All-S.T.A.R. Fellows for the upcoming academic year.
UMD has approximately 4000 graduate students serving the campus as teaching, administrative or research assistants. Graduate School Dean Charles Caramello, in a letter to Koliska, said, “The Graduate School All-S.T.A.R. Fellowships support and honor graduate students who are both outstanding scholars and outstanding graduate assistants.”
Koliska is a journalist who started his Ph.D. studies in Knight Hall in 2010 after working as an editor for China Radio International in Beijing. The Merrill College nominated him for the fellowship – which carries with it a $10,000 stipend and will allow him to continue his assistantship and scholarly research.”
“I appreciate the confidence shown in my work by the Merrill College and the University of Maryland,” said Koliska. “The All-S.T.A.R. Fellowship comes at just the right time to provide funds for the experiments I’ll be conducting for my dissertation.”
Merrill College Professor Linda Steiner heads Koliska’s Dissertation Committee. She said, “Micha Koliska is highly deserving of the All-S.T.A.R. award. He has not only performed effectively in the classroom, but also has provided superb service to the college, significantly improving the experiences of his fellow students, faculty and staff. And this year Mr. Koliska dramatically picked up the pace of his research.”
This year he co-authored several articles that have or will appear in well-respected journals, including one (with Stine Eckert) about myth and reality in the television series The Newsroom; one co-authored (with Dr. Kalyani Chadha) about transparency; and one about the political blogosphere in Germany.
Koliska’s dissertation looks at whether or how transparency generates or enhances trust in journalism, and whether or how journalists use transparency to gain social legitimacy among audiences. Steiner said, “It should be useful to find out whether journalists’ efforts to show themselves as transparent are (or are not) recognized by news audiences as such and whether they do increase trust in a news organization, as intended.”
About Michael Koliska
Michael Koliska worked as radio reporter for the last 10 years in Germany, the US and China. He has a MA degree in Sociology and English from Magdeburg’s Otto-von-Guericke University in Germany, where he worked for a private radio station, a local newspaper and then Germany’s largest broadcast network. He then joined an NPR affiliate in Illinois as news anchor/ reporter while pursuing a MS in Journalism at the University of Illinois. His latest assignment was as editor for China Radio International in Beijing, China.
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