Margot Susca Assistant Professor Journalism
- Degrees
- Ph.D. Mass Communication, Florida State University
M.S. Journalism, Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism
B.A. Journalism and Political Science, UMass Amherst - Favorite Spot on Campus
- The Woods-Brown Amphitheater
- Bio
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Margot Susca is the School of Communication’s inaugural assistant professor of journalism, accountability, and democracy. A recognized expert in local news and private investment funds, Dr. Susca combines investigative reporting techniques with critical political economic methods to study journalism and civic engagement in U.S. democratic society. In January 2024, the University of Illinois Press published her first book, Hedged: How Private Investment Funds Helped Destroy American Newspapers and Undermine Democracy. It won the Frank Luther Mott/Kappa Tau Alpha Research Award, which honors the best research-based book about journalism or mass communication published during the year. Dr. Susca's second book is under contract with the University of Massachusetts Press. Her scholarship also has been published in peer-reviewed journals including Communication and Democracy; Critical Studies in Media Communication; and Communication, Culture, & Critique.
Dr. Susca's academic and professional experiences inform her work as a mentor, scholar, and teacher. In 2022, she won American University’s Outstanding Teaching Award given annually to a full-time faculty member in a tenure-line position. Before earning a doctorate, she worked as a newspaper reporter in Connecticut and Florida. She brings those experiences to the classroom providing a professional vantage point to complement her scholarly expertise. She mentors and teaches undergraduate and graduate students in the School of Communication and as a Complex Problems fellow works with first-years from every University major. Since 2016, Dr. Susca regularly has served as an associate editor at the nonprofit Investigative Reporting Workshop on campus founded by Charles Lewis.
Off campus, she was selected in 2019 as a Maynard Institute for Journalism Education fellowship mentor in the Storytelling/Investigative Reporting track, and she has worked as an assessor with Poynter's International Fact Check Network since 2016. Dr. Susca is a frequent guest and expert on news programs and podcasts around the world discussing journalism and society, the business of media, and corporate media ownership. She lives in Washington, D.C. with her daughter.
- See Also
- For the Media
- To request an interview for a news story, call AU Communications at 202-885-5950 or submit a request.
Teaching
Fall 2024
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COMM-200 Writing for Communication
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COMM-320 Reporting
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COMM-899 Doctoral Dissertation
Spring 2025
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COMM-100 Understanding Media
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COMM-899 Doctoral Dissertation
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CORE-105 Complex Problems Seminar: Democracy Along the Red Line
AU Experts
Area of Expertise
Corporate media ownership including private equity and hedge funds in journalism; media economics; newspapers and democracy; media and society including media effects.
Additional Information
Margot Susca (Ph.D., Florida State University) is an assistant professor in the journalism division whose work operates at the intersection of investigative journalism and critical communications research. Dr. Susca's first book, an investigation of private investment funds in the U.S. newspaper industry, is under contract with the University of Illinois Press.
For the Media
To request an interview for a news story, call AU Communications at 202-885-5950 or submit a request.