About the Instructor:
Bryan Reckard is an Instructor of Strategic Communication and the Media Learning Lab Coordinator in the Department of Communication at the University of Colorado Denver. Dr. Reckard received his PhD in 2023 from the University of Illinois and has taught courses related to media and popular culture, rhetoric and public and foreign policy discourses, strategic communication, public speaking, and civic life. In addition to teaching at the University of Illinois and CU Denver, he has also taught courses at the University of Denver and has taught a variety of public speaking and writing courses for prisoners in Colorado’s state penal system, sharing the privilege of education with some of our most underserved individuals. Dr. Reckard has published academic journal articles, book chapters, and his work has been accepted for presentation at numerous scholarly conferences including multiple National Communication Association Conferences, the Western States Communication Association Conference, and the Rhetoric Society of America Biennial Conference, among others. Before becoming a teacher, he spent six years as a military public affairs specialist and media producer in the U.S. Navy, strategically communicating with numerous audiences on a global scale to tell the Navy’s story and to help it achieve its goals. His international experiences in public relations and as a public communicator with the military influences him to see himself as just as much a global citizen as an American one. As a result, he encourages his students to see the world as interconnected even when fractured by difference, to see diversity, difference, and complexity as strengths of a multicultural and equitable society, and to see themselves as agents of change able to influence public life to create a better world for all.