Department Chair, Journalism and Mass Communications
“Believe and act as if it were impossible to fail.”
Five years after South Side Chicago native Rucker graduated from Northern Illinois University, Ted Turner hired him as a CNN national correspondent. Rucker had already worked as a reporter in Des Moines and Philadelphia and a national news reporter for Newsweek. Among the hundreds of stories he’s covered, his personal favorites include reporting on the Three Mile Island nuclear accident and interviewing Pope John Paul II and Sen. Edward Kennedy on live television. At SJSU, Rucker relishes the classroom’s “dynamic energy,” he says. “Inspiring students’ passion for creative, ethical and responsible advertising, journalism and public relations makes teaching a great joy.”
Department: Journalism and Mass Communications
Faculty website: Bob Rucker
College: College of Applied Sciences and Arts
Photo: David Schmitz
