Charles E. “Charlie” Hood, former dean of the University of Montana school of journalism and the founder of the journalism program at AAU, died in October of Parkinson’s disease at the age of 73.
Hood (http://www.whitesittfuneralhome.com/index.php/obituaries/details/269-charles-e-qcharlieq-hood) acquired a strong interest for international affairs during his 26 years as a professor and dean at UM, and had a desire to learn from students and journalists from former communist countries. He believed in their right to write free of censorship and other constraints.
Out of this passion, he developed a journalism program at AAU. “He helped us to establish a journalism minor and certificate in journalism years before we got accreditation for the BA program in journalism,” said Tony Ozuna, associate dean of the AAU school of journalism. “Charlie taught on faculty and he served as director of the journalism program from approximately 1999 to 2005.”
Will Tizard, current journalism professor at AAU, remembered Hood saying, “Charlie was my mentor and encouraged me in every way he could to venture into journalism teaching back in 2004, leading to my inheriting his reporting courses when he moved on from Prague in 2005.
He was a master copy editor and an inspiring teacher who relished firing up students and coaching on the craft of hectoring the powers that be with good, common-sense questions. I still use his lessons every semester – and learn from them myself.”
