UTSC Centennial College Journalism Joint Program > Faculty

Ted Fairhurst is a former CBC Radio News journalist. He now teaches part-time in all three of Centennial’s journalism programs. He also coordinates the college component of the Joint Journalism Program.

Fairhurst joined the CBC in the early 1970s after completing the Radio and Television Arts Program at Ryerson and undergraduate studies at the University of Toronto. He also holds an MA in sociology from York University.

Over his 27 years at the CBC, Fairhurst performed several editorial roles as a member of the CBC Toronto local/regional radio newsroom. They included two periods of municipal affairs reporting at Toronto City Hall. He also worked as a general assignment reporter and desk editor. He was involved in the coverage of municipal and provincial elections, political leadership conventions and major stories that included the Mississauga train derailment and the public health hazard of lead pollution in two Toronto neighbourhoods. During the 1990s he was the morning newscast editor for Metro Morning and the editor and newsreader for Ontario Morning.

Fairhurst’s academic interests focus on media law and the ethics and history of journalism.

For information, contact Ted Fairhurst at tfairhurst@centennialcollege.ca.

Anne Lavrih has been working in radio since 1985 and has done just about everything along the way. She's been a club and concert reporter (99.9 CKFM), she's done split-shift traffic and produced weekly news features (97.3 CJEZ); she's been a news anchor, reported the weather and has even been a ski and snowboard reporter (680 CFTR). More recently Anne has been a general assignment reporter, news editor and is currently is the Newsroom Coordinator at Toronto's number one all-news radio station (680News).

Anne has emceed numerous ‘Women of Influence' luncheons at the Metro Convention Centre and has anchored on CFMT TV. Anne is also busy voicing commercials, radio promotions and is the voice of the 680News Calendar and Website. She also interviews, produces and voices the ‘Today's Parent Minute', a broadcast feature heard across Canada which tackles child and family issues.

Born and raised in Toronto, Anne graduated from the University of Toronto with a Bachelors of Arts. She teaches at Centennial College; Radio News and Career Management. Anne has also guest lectured at Ryerson University and Seneca College and sits on the Program Advisory Committee at Sheridan College.

Ellin Bessner is a professional journalist and a professor of journalism at Centennial College in Toronto.

A graduate of Carleton University’s journalism program, Ellin worked for CBC News in the Maritimes, Montreal, Ottawa and Toronto as a radio and television reporter, anchor and editor. She spent half a dozen years as a foreign correspondent based in Rome, Italy, covering the Vatican, Italian life, and conflicts and four wars in Africa, including Mozambique, Liberia, Sierra Leone and Cote d’Ivoire. She freelanced in Italy mostly for the CBC, the Globe and Mail, Canadian Press, and Deutche Welle Radio.

She also worked for the World Food Programme of the United Nations from 1989 to 1994.

She returned to Canada in 1994, where she was Canadian correspondent for Vatican Radio while working as a reporter for CBC Radio and Television in Toronto until 1997. That year she was hired to help launch CTV News Net, the all-news channel, now CTV News Channel, where she worked as a writer, chase producer and on air as a business anchor until 2006.

She has been teaching broadcasting courses since 2000, first at Ryerson University and later at Seneca College, before she joined Centennial College in 2006. She runs the radio and television news curriculum there, teaching videography, editing, podcasting, advanced magazine publishing, multiplatform journalism and interviewing.

She is a national director on the board of the Canadian Association of Journalists. And she freelances for the Toronto Star and other news outlets in the Toronto area.

Ellin’s most memorable career moments include interviews with Prince Philip and the Dalai Lama, covering Pope John Paul ll at the Vatican, the World Cup of Soccer and the 2003 Space Shuttle disaster in Florida.

Jules Elder is a veteran journalist and educator. He also works with OMNI Television, where he is a writer-editor in the News Department, Commentator and associate producer for In the Black. Prior to joining OMNI Television, he was managing editor of Share Newspaper, which he helped to launch. He is a former columnist for the Toronto Sun and freelance contributor for Radio Canada International.

Elder is a member of the Canadian Association of Black Journalists and the Canadian Media Association.

In 20 years of journalism, Andrew Mair has done just about everything there is to do on a newspaper. He has been a reporter, sports editor, entertainment editor, copy editor, travel writer, movie reviewer, photographer, editorial cartoonist, page designer, general manager and the editor-in-chief of three newspapers. Since 1998, he has worked at the Toronto Sun as a copy and layout editor on the news desk. Prior to that, he was with the Toronto Star, editing on the city, entertainment, lifestyle and op-ed desks. He was also the editor-in-chief of three Metroland papers after working his way through several roles. He got his start at his hometown paper, the Elliot Lake Standard, as sports editor.

Mair has won numerous awards from the CCNA, OCNA and SNA as well as for his community involvement through newspapers. He has served on hospital boards, chambers of commerce and community advisory panels. He is also the founder of the Uxbridge Art in the Park festival. In 2006, he was editor-in-chief of ICON, Canada's first multimedia celebrity publication, which was a pilot project produced for the Ontario Ministry of Culture, employing 18 Centennial graduates.

Mair joined Centennial College in 2004 and has taught newspaper design and layout as well as serving as a faculty editor on the East Toronto Observer newspapers at both The Centre for Creative Communications and University of Toronto Scarborough Campus/HP Centre for Technology.

Eric McMillan is editor-in-chief of MulticomMedia publications including the Town Crier community newspapers in Toronto and Vaughan Today magazine. He has had a long career in the industry, involving reporting, editing, design and publishing in both news and technology media. He is also chair of Skeptics Canada, a national organization promoting science and critical inquiry (www.skeptics.ca).

In addition to teaching journalism at Centennial, he also teaches philosophy at York University where he is pursuing a PhD. He is also creator and writer of the popular literary website EditorEric.com which discusses the greatest books of all time. He teaches copy editing and is the lead instructor for the news lab, The Online Observer.

Philip Alves is an award-winning reporter, photographer and online editor. He's worked for and has had his work published by a variety of news organizations, including Vaughan Today, the Town Crier, the Toronto Star and the National Post, among others.

Alves freelanced for the National Post after completing Centennial College's post-grad journalism program in 2007 and before joining Vaughan Today. Prior to his time at Centennial's j-school, he graduated from the University of Toronto with an Honours BA in archaeology, then entered the new media business of creating websites. He joined the Centennial/UTSC Journalism Joint Program in 2009 as online co-editor for the student-produced Toronto Observer.

Joseph Marranca has been a professional photographer since graduating from the Sheridan College Commercial Photography Course in 1995. After spending the first two years interning on a freelance basis with other more established photographers, Joseph decided to go on his own. Clients like Visa, Rogers Media, Wendy's , Harper Collins Publishing and Naylor Publishing have called on Joseph for his photography.

With experience in many different areas of the photography field ranging from editorial, journalism, fashion, corporate and advertising Joseph has the ability to work in any type of photography he may choose. Being self taught in digital capture and image manipulation has also strengthened his arsenal of talents and he continues to update his skills as the technology evolves.

Joseph has an award from Applied Arts Magazine, been featured in The Art Buyer and has taken part in a panel discussion on Rogers Cable about the arts from a photographers view point.

Paul Grossinger has been a print journalist - both newspapers and magazines - for the past 14 years. He graduated from Ryerson University's School of Journalism in 1996 and worked as a freelance writer for many years. 

After a stint as a newspaper reporter at a community newspaper in Peterborough, Ont., Paul became editor of a national trade magazine in the security industry. He spent seven years at this publication before leaving in 1996 to open KAP Publishing Ltd., which now publishes 5 magazines in both the B2B and consumer arenas: Security Matters, Security Products Canada/Sécurité Québec, Canada Camps, Canada Camps for Parents and Friday Night. Each magazine is fully entrenched in the industry it covers and has become a leading source of information for its respective readers. Combined with web sites, e-mail newsletters and events, KAP Publishing has become a full-service media company that offers top notch work.

KAP Publishing also partners with several associations to produce custom publications on their behalf, including magazines, newsletters, web sites, directories and other marketing materials.

Paul is also a past nominee of several K.R Wilson Awards, which honours quality journalism in the business-to-business magazine industry.

As the founding Executive Producer of Global National with Kevin Newman, George Browne was instrumental in helping define the nightly newscast as the premier destination for Canadian viewers from coast to coast. Before his time on Global National, George was a producer and senior producer at Global BC (BCTV). In 2005, He moved to Canwest Interactive as Senior Manager of Broadcast Websites, including Globaltv.com and Global News, before returning to television in 2008 as Senior Producer, Current Affairs for SUNTV.

A passionate documentary filmmaker, with over 20 years of news journalism experience, his many documentaries and television specials, including Toronto 2020 (2010), Saattuq; Thin Ice: Global Warming and Sovereignty in Canada’s Arctic (2007), Recruitment for Terror (2006), Know Your Enemy: al Qaeda’s Third Wave (2005), Tweens – Too Fast Too Soon (2003) and The Spirit of Bill Reid (1996), have won national and international awards and earned him five Gemini nominations.

Always preferring to stay on the cutting edge of new and innovative media, George has once again turned his attention to the digital world. Currently, he leads a team of national digital producers in Toronto and Vancouver responsible for the daily editorial, development and workflow of Globalnews.ca, Globalnational.com, and Global16x9.com.

Lisa Khoo is Senior Producer with CBC News World Report, CBC Radio's major morning news program reaching 1 million listeners daily. Prior to that she was a Senior Producer with CBC News' Live Desk overseeing integrated breaking news coverage for CBC television, radio and online. Lisa was senior producer for CBC Radio's The Current from 2006-2009. Before that she was with CBC News Online as senior producer for current affairs, establishing news journalistic standards for the team. Both News Online and The Current garnered several awards under her senior leadership. From 1993-97 she was part of a three person live specials unit at CBC which pioneered breaking news coverage for CBC Newsworld. Lisa has also worked as a field and show producer in the CBC's London, Washington and Toronto bureaus.

Since 2008 Lisa has taught journalism at the University of Toronto Scarborough-Centennial College's joint journalism program. Her academic specialty is New Media Ethics, which she taught at UTSC in a self-designed course. She has also taught journalistic writing, introduction to journalism and multiplatform journalism.

Lisa is the author of From Here to E, a guide to getting a job in the New Economy, published by Pearson Education in 2000.

Lisa obtained her BA from the University of Toronto in history and political science in 1989 and her Masters degree from Columbia University's Graduate School of Journalism in New York in 1990.

Veteran magazine editor Peter Carter started his career at the Elliot Lake Standard. Since then, he has worked for some of Canada’s smallest publications — and for some of its largest.

The Manitoulin Island Expositor under Peter’s watch was the first weekly newspaper to win the coveted Michener Award for Meritorious Public Service Journalism. When he was a staff editor and writer at Chatelaine, his Family Room column was one of the magazine’s must reads. Under Peter’s editorial leadership, the Metro Toronto Business Journal was named ‘Best Little Magazine’ in Canada by the Canadian Society of Magazine Editors. He was also editor in chief of Harrowsmith Country Life.

Currently, Peter edits Today’s Trucking, Canada’s pre-eminent business magazine for the trucking industry. He is quick to say that the students he meets while teaching magazine and freelance journalism at Centennial fill him with optimism about the future of Canada and its journalism.

When Peter Hadzipetros began his journalism career, cut and paste required a razor blade and adhesive tape and you needed a crew to carry a mobile phone. While the technology may have advanced somewhat, the heart of the craft remains the same: good writing. He practiced that craft for almost three decades at CBC News in radio, television and online.

He’s currently peddling words to Globalnews.ca and Canadian Running magazine, where he gets to wax poetic about one of his other passions — long-distance running. When not writing, committing random acts of journalism or running along Toronto’s waterfront, you can usually find him on his carpet, playing with his twin baby girls.