Stephen LanziMy name is Stephen Lanzi, and I am the new communications specialist at CEDHARS and the UAB/Lakeshore Research Collaborative. I am extremely excited for this opportunity to promote and advance the mission of CEDHARS and the Research Collaborative, and I hope you join me in this newsletter as we look at all the groundbreaking research CEDHARS and the Collaborative have to share.

In thinking through the role and responsibilities of my position, I feel as though I couldn’t have spent my time preparing myself any better to this point. While attending Auburn University, where I graduated with degrees in journalism and political science, I developed a passion for writing and communicating to tell others’ stories.

While on The Plains, I quickly joined The Auburn Plainsman, the most highly decorated student-run newspaper in the country, where I worked for nearly four years, three of which as an editor. With nearly 250,000 monthly online readers, I was responsible for an array of duties while serving in roles of campus editor and opinions editor, as well as editor for the entire paper for a summer.

I conducted interviews; wrote nearly 200 stories, ranging from hard-news stories to long-form features on students and research at the university; edited hundreds more and collaborated with other writers and editors to ensure our readers were well-informed on everything on campus and around the community.

These vast experiences not only gave me the skills to communicate everything going on at the CEDHARS and the Collaborative, and to effectively relay messages from them both.

Also, while at Auburn, I had many other experiences that I believe prepared me for the position, such as working as a summer intern at The Auburn Magazine, writing feature stories on the work and achievements of alumni and managing the stories on social media and the magazine’s website. I held management and communication positions for other student organizations, as well.

I also served as president of Auburn’s Honors Congress, which is essentially the SGA for the Honors College, honing my leadership and interpersonal communication skills.

I also think I will be a great fit for the job because I am personally extremely passionate about advancing the groundbreaking work at UAB and Lakeshore. As someone who lives with a disability, I am intimately aware that I would have likely never been able to accomplish everything discussed above without the help and support from friends, family and people in the disability community. I can think of no better way to return the favor than to work to promote the foundation and expand opportunity and outreach.