Founding faculty member for broadcast communications to retire

Jeffrey Guterman, who started the broadcast communications major at the University of Pittsburgh at Bradford, served as chair of the Division of Communications and the Arts for nearly 20 years, and is one of its longest-serving professors, will retire Aug. 20.

He came to Pitt-Bradford in 1985, having previously taught at Oregon State University and later SUNY Cortland. Prior to that, he was a television producer and director in the Pacific Northwest.

Guterman has always been known for his hands-on approach, taking students to the field to give them many hours of hands-on experience before launching their broadcast careers. 

Jennifer Lewke ’05, an award-winning investigative reporter at WHEC-TV in Rochester, N.Y., spoke about that at a retirement reception held in April.

“I had big dreams of becoming a reporter, but I had never picked up a camera,” she said. “I had never shot a stand up. I had great big dreams, but no actual tangible skills until I met Jeff.”

Lewke is one of several alumni of the Pitt-Bradford program who have gone on to win an Emmy, an Edward R. Murrow Award and work at ESPN.

In 2003, he was among the first members of the faculty honored by the Pitt-Bradford Alumni Association with its Teaching Excellence Award.

“Jeff really stands out as a teacher,” Rich Jarrett ’94 said at the time. “He not only has a tremendous knowledge of broadcasting and communications, he made the classroom a fun place to be.”

He also received the Excellence in Teaching Award from Pitt-Bradford’s student chapter of the National Society of Leadership and Success.

While teaching Mass Media and Society, Survey of Broadcasting, Introduction to Television Production, Radio Production, Advanced Television Production and Capstone in Communications, he has also served as chair of the Division of Communications and the Arts since 2005. 

He worked closely with fellow faculty and architect Albert Filoni on the design and construction of Blaisdell Hall, the university’s home for communications and fine arts.

Guterman is a past president of the Communication Administrators of Pennsylvania. He has earned numerous awards from the Broadcast Communications Association for research papers and videos on the advancement in television technology.

“At a conference of the Western Communication Association in June 1994, I predicted (based on my research) that advertising would soon appear on the internet,” he said. “Most researchers in attendance disagreed with my findings (which were panned, actually). And yet, the first banner ad appeared on the internet (which wasn’t really called the internet back then) just a few months later.”

In 2008, he and his wife, Joan, set up a scholarship to help students in the broadcast communications program. They live in Allegany, N.Y.

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