About

About you

░░Meaningful jobs people didn't pay me to do which helped me grow as a person —

OREGON EDUCATION ASSOCIATION. Board of Directors 2006–present. OEA Resolutions Committee 2005-2007. NEA Resolutions Committee member representing OEA teachers 2005–2007. OEA-NEA Member 1979–present.

PORTLAND ASSOCIATION OF TEACHERS. Executive Board 2004–2012. PAT Member 1984–present. PAT-RA, OEA-RA, NEA-RA. Building Rep, PAT-OEA-NEA PIE, Teacher Voice In Politics Political Action Committee Board Member. Membership Committee, Legislative Committee, Bargaining Committee, Study Leave Committee, Instructional and Professional Development Committee and High School Reform Subcommittee.

JOURNALISM EDUCATION ASSOCIATION. Vice-President 1997–2001. (Ran for president and lost by 5 votes.) Responsible for $1.5 million budget including investments, operating revenue and scholarships; monthly reports and annual audits; planning two conventions a year. Board member 1987–89, 1993–2001 representing Northwest. Publications Commission. I served as a member of the Curriculum Committee, and as chairman of the Conventions Committee which recommended changing the way conventions are sponsored, financed and organized. Those recommendations were fully implemented. I redesigned the JEA/NSPA convention program in fall 1988, and produced a 250-page resource notebook for two conventions (Fall 1988, Spring 1989). I was chair of the planning committee for the spring 1987 national convention in Portland, Oregon, and on the planning committee of the Fall 1988 convention in Washington, D.C. Responsible for developing JEA Bookstore and increasing sales to the point where a full-time manager was hired. Convention Chair 1987. National Convention Speaker. Member 1979–present.

OREGON JOURNALISM EDUCATION ASSOCIATION. Past President. Board member. 1993–2001, 1982–88. Past president. Helped found organization as charter member. Founder and Summer Workshop Director 1983–1990 at Southern Oregon State College in Ashland, Ore. Member since its incorporation in 1982. Served previously as president (1984-88), first vice-president (1983-84) and secretary (1982). Its goal is to promote high standards in journalism through education. Responsibilities as president included supervising a variety of activities—including a bimonthly newsletter, fall press day for high school students and advisers, a summer workshop, teacher in-service day, mail-in clip contest, write-off competition, spring awards banquet, critique service and scholarship competition.

NORTHWEST SCHOLASTIC PRESS. Executive Director 2011-2012. Nonprofit administration; work with board to achieve organizational goals; event management for annual Oregon high school press conference; newsletter writing/editing/proofreading; promote and coordinate resources for contests, competitions and scholarship programs; WordPress site administration for nwscholasticpress.org website, including copywriting, photo and graphic preparation. Provide consulting services to teachers and their students, including travel, to improve journalism programs. Founded in 1984, NWSP provides services to the scholastic journalism community in the Northwest, including conferences, workshops, contests, critiques, awards and scholarships. NWSP is an affiliate of Journalism Education Association. Nonprofit 503(c)(3) and Public Charity 509(a)(2).

ASSOCIATED STUDENT PRESS WEB SITE. Content and Design Consultant. 1998.

PORTLAND CENTER STAGE/OREGON SHAKESPEARE FESTIVAL. Docent. Volunteer 1990–2017.

EDITORIAL BOARD CHAIR. The United Methodist magazine. Oregon-Idaho Conference. 1994–1997.

CONTEXTUAL LEARNING CONSORTIUM. Oregon State University. Dale Parnell, coordinator. 1995–1998.

OREGON NEWSPAPER PUBLISHERS ASSOCIATION EDUCATION COMMITTEE. 1985–90. Member 1985-90. This committee was made up of college journalism educators, high school journalism educators and newspaper publishers.

TRAVEL. Traveled extensively in Europe, North Africa, Canada, U.S.

░░THINGS I’VE WRITTEN AND PRODUCED —

ACADEMIC PLANNER. Roosevelt High School, Portland, OR. 2016-2019.

EDITOR. Newspaper Designer’s Handbook by Tim Harrower.

FRIESENS YEARBOOK CURRICULUM GUIDE. Writing Chapter by Rob Melton. Friesens Corporation. 2011.

NEWS WRITER’S HANDBOOK. 2005.

THE SECOND PAGE: An advanced PageMaker curriculum. By Rob Melton, Pam Oman and Mary Pulliam. Jostens. Minneapolis, Minnesota. 1992.

ADVERTISING A–Z. By Rob Melton and Sunny Stautz. Journalism Education Association. 1991.

NEWSPAPER STAFF MANUAL. By Rob Melton. 200 pages. 1989.

TEACHER RESOURCE NOTEBOOK. Editor. Manhattan, Kansas. Journalism Education Association. 1989.

JEA CURRICULUM NOTEBOOK. Editor. Manhattan, Kansas. Journalism Education Association. 1988.

░░SOMETIMES HARD WORK, GREAT PEOPLE, AND A GREAT PRODUCT GET NOTICED —

CARL TOWLEY AWARD. Journalism Education Association’s highest award. 2002.

SPEAKER. Workers Rights Board Hearing/Jobs For Justice. 2002.

NEWSPAPER INNOVATORS IN EDUCATION AWARD. Newspaper Association of America/Freedom Forum. Vienna, Virginia. August 2001.

2001 AL NEUHARTH FREE SPIRIT STUDENT JOURNALISM CONFERENCE. Oregon Adviser Delegate. Washington, D.C. November 2000.

NEWSPAPER ASSOCIATION OF AMERICA DIVERSITY WORKSHOP. Washington, D.C. July 1998.

WHO’S WHO AMONG AMERICA’S TEACHERS. November 1997, 2005. Nominated by former students who have made the Dean’s List at college.

NSPA PIONEER AWARD. National Scholastic Press Association. Minneapolis, Minnesota. November 1994. For outstanding contributions to scholastic journalism over an extended period of time.

NSPA PUBLICATION AWARDS: 14 NSPA All-Americans, 7 Regional Pacemakers (top 20), 2 national Pacemakers (top 5). Minneapolis, Minnesota. 1982–91.

MEDAL OF MERIT. Journalism Education Association. November 1991. For distinguished service to scholastic journalism on the national level.

NATIONAL SCHOLASTIC PRESS ASSOCIATION HALL OF FAME. Inducted for winning more than 10 consecutive years of All-American Awards, regional, and national Pacemaker Awards. Spring 1991.

MASTER JOURNALISM EDUCATOR. Journalism Education Association. 1993. CJE 1990.

CENTER FOR SHAKESPEARE STUDIES. Spring Symposium Scholar. Ashland, Oregon. 1990.

AEJMC/ANPA RECOGNITION. Journalism program named one of the top 70 in the country. Fall 1990.

DISTINGUISHED ADVISER. Dow Jones Newspaper Fund. Runner-up, journalism teacher of the year. November 17-19, 1988. Special recognition adviser November 1983.

Oregon Journalism Education Association Publications Olympics. First Place Sweepstakes Award: May 1984, 1985. State high school mail-in competition. In 1988, Best of Category in In-Depth supplement (on AIDS); Best of Category, Editorial Cartooning; Best of Category, Photography; Excellents in all other categories.

Portland Advertising Federation High School Advertising Competition. First Place: April 1, 1983, to Roseburg Senior High School Journalism I class for campaign “Oregon—A State of Adventure” by Journalism I class in statewide competition.

ASSOCIATED PRESS MANAGING EDITORS AWARD. East Oregonian reporting team. April 1977.

Dow Jones Newspaper Fund Distinguished Adviser. November 17-19, 1988. One of five teachers honored along with the national high school journalism Teacher of the Year. Special Recognition Adviser. November 19, 1983. One of 11 teachers honored along with the national high school journalism Teacher of the Year.

░░AND SOMETIMES IT DOESN'T GET NOTICED —

I've provided election-related editing, reframes, and advice to a statewide and national association leaders. I've done a lot of behind-the-scenes work for people and causes I believe in. If people are going to buy in, it must be we, not me.

Rep. Larry Galizio. Yep, the one who authored and wordsmithed the Oregon Student Free Speech Law for high school and college students. I helped with behind-the-scenes organizing and recruitment of student speakers, and gathering advice from an OEA lobbyist friend about how to navigate a bill into law. I wasn't at the signing with the governor because I was teaching a week-long advisers workshop at the University of Iowa School of Journalism, but one of my national advisers, Angela Marie Pena, was there in my place.

Mary Beth Tinker. She came to Oregon. We had lunch together, and she spoke to students in Portland from around the state. She asked me to talk about how we got the free speech bill passed. Dream come true! Who knew.

I wrote a communication messaging strategy for several organizations that are still in use today.

When I was a senior in high school and the local weekly hired me as their editor, I covered crime, politics, weddings, business, city council, police, Little League, sports -- you name it. After reporting on the old police chief versus the new police (one drove home the drunks and the other arrested them -- you can only imagine the drama), New Yorker weekly columnist came to Cloverdale to cover the story and -- this has never been revealed before -- interviewed me in the diner next door (that was a thing of his), and also John Sink (one of my tennis partners) and Margery Mills (a friend). My sister married the son of one of the city council members of that time. It was published a week later. Small world.

Al Neuharth, publisher of USA Today, bet me I couldn't recite the First Amendment from memory -- and had to pay me $20 and also gave me an autographed copy of his book, which I still have.

Our first national newspaper award for our high school newspaper was designed entirely in Helvetica. We sweated the type details to get it just right because the editor claimed he couldn't tell the difference between Times and Helvetica. I never believed that, but he did go on to work on Microsoft Books -- which were all set beautifully in Helvetica!

Another amazing Roseburg journalism student is now the editor of a major Pacific Northwest daily newspaper. I've occasionally heard about others over the years.

I wrote a book for high school newspaper staffs (mostly mine!) about advertising, and a group of students created a company that was based on an idea I always shared, which was to decide on 3-5 personality words to describe your finished project or design. They built out one of the first web-based advertising agencies on that idea and it is still a highly successful business.

I was also the Writers In The Schools (WITS) coordinator at Benson (when did I ever sleep?!) and frequently had writers in my classroom for workshops that lasted a few weeks. It's fun and fascinating to see how they teach students to write, and then read their books! I'm a fan of all of them!

░░PLACES I’VE BEEN —

Traveled throughout Europe June–August 1973. Visited England, the Netherlands, Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Italy, France, Spain and Morocco, North Africa. Mexico. Canada.

After travelling abroad, I returned with a strong desire to see and get to know the rest of my country. I spent the next 40 years traveling across the country visiting, photographing, and talking to locals about the places they call home.

States (31 and counting): Arizona, California, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Idaho, Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Louisiana, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Mexico, New York (does LaGuardia count?), North Carolina, Ohio, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Virginia, Washington, Washington D.C., Wyoming. (The states get bigger as you head west, and I've been to 18 of the 22 states west of the Mississippi except for North and South Dakota, Oklahoma, and Arkansas. That covers a lot of real estate. Plus 10 of those states that get smaller as you head east! )

I also decided to write and photograph about the places I call home. I’ve been to every corner in Oregon, and lived in Southern Oregon, Eastern Oregon, and Western Oregon.

Speaker at journalism workshops and conventions in Arizona, California, Colorado, Hawaii, Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, New Mexico, Ohio, Oregon, Texas, Washington, Washington D.C.