Cynthia Faulkner

Cynthia Faulkner is an instructor in pro media at the University of Central Oklahoma and is serving as the interim adviser for the student publication The Vista. After starting out in newspapers, Faulkner spent the majority of her career at ESPN.com with a short stint at Yahoo Sports.

The first five years at ESPN.com, Faulkner was in charge of coverage of tennis as well as the editor on the ground for the Olympic Games in Salt Lake City and Athens. 

As a senior editor, she worked with columnists such as Rick Reilly, Jason Whitlock, Scoop Jackson, Johnette Howard and Gregg Easterbrook. At Yahoo Sports, she determined the content placement for the sports home page for some of the highest trafficked days of the week.

Faulkner grew up in Missouri where she earned her degrees. She worked at newspapers in Louisiana and Texas before moving to Connecticut.

After living for 17 years in snowy New England, she is enjoying being close to family again and reveling in the lack of snow! In her free time, she paper crafts and makes jewelry.

MCOM 1103 — Intro to Mass Communications, available online only

MCOM 1133 — Media Writing, online and face-to-face

MCOM 3143 — Editing, online and face-to-face

MCOM 4423 — Media Ethics, online in summer

MCOM 3990 — Sports for the Web, face-to-face

Faulkner serves on the advisory board for the Vista at UCO.

BA in Social Science Education, Southwest Baptist University, Bolivar, Missouri

MA in Journalism, University of Missouri, Columbia, Missouri

Majority of career spent at ESPN.com from 2000-2015. Versatile editor often assisted other editors in NFL, NBA, NHL and MLB and motor sports when tennis and Olympics were in the offseason. Supervised community group and integration of social media content. Helped launch special sections for championship events and guided content implementation of ESPN's Apple news reader. As a senior editor, worked with columnists on national sports stories. Responsible for training all new editors on content management system and creating and updating the training guide. One of the first editors on ESPN.com's long-form feature stories, winning a Sports Emmy, and helped create a template that allowed for more frequent and quick creation of special presentations. 

Previously, worked in newspapers in Louisiana and Texas on the metro and feature desks before switching to sports full time. Joined a startup in early 2000 that lasted only four months, but gained valuable web experience in the internet's early days. 

In 2016-17, worked in Manhattan at Yahoo Sports before making the leap back to first love of education.