Vice President for Strategic Communications
Lou Heldman is responsible for university communications and marketing. He serves as a member of the President’s Executive Team and the board of directors of the Wichita State Innovation Alliance.
Lou’s previous roles at the university included interim director of the Center for Entrepreneurship and of the Elliott School of Communication.
As the university’s Distinguished Senior Fellow in Media Management and Journalism, he taught communication courses and business seminars centered on the impact of the Internet on media, business and society. He also created and taught a seminar on media innovation and entrepreneurship in the Dorothy and Bill Cohen Honors College.
Prior to joining the university in 2007, he had a career in newspapers and websites, including as President and Publisher of the Wichita Eagle and Kansas.com, the state’s largest newspaper and most visited news website.
As managing editor in Fort Wayne, Ind., he led staff news coverage that was awarded a Pulitzer Prize for local reporting. He also worked as an editor or publisher at newspapers in Miami, Detroit, Tallahassee and State College, Pa. In Miami, he was part of the team that created the Spanish-language daily El Nuevo Herald.
He is a graduate of Ohio State University and of the Program for Management Development at Harvard Business School.