Matthew W. Ragas

Matt Ragas (Ph.D., University of Florida) is a tenured full professor and founding director of the MA in Professional Communication program in the College of Communication at DePaul University, Chicago, USA. An award-winning teacher, researcher and student mentor, he has authored, co-authored or co-edited more than 50 scholarly articles, book chapters, trade articles, and research reports, as well as five books, including Business Acumen for Strategic Communicators: A Primer (Emerald Publishing, 2021), Mastering Business for Strategic Communicators (Emerald Publishing, 2018) and Business Essentials for Strategic Communicators (Palgrave Macmillan, 2014). This includes peer-reviewed scholarship in Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly, Corporate Communications, Journal of Communication Management, International Journal of Strategic Communication, PR Journal, Public Relations Review, and Journalism Studies, among others. He previously served as academic director of the top ranked (as per the PRWeek Awards) DePaul PR and advertising graduate program.

A recipient of the Nafziger-White-Salwen dissertation award from the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication (AEJMC), he has been a fellow of the Donald W. Reynolds National Center for Business Journalism at Arizona State University, The Plank Center for Leadership in Public Relations at The University of Alabama, a Coleman Foundation faculty entrepreneurship fellow, and an Op-Ed Project public voices fellow. A member of the Arthur W. Page Society, he has been the faculty adviser on 11 award-winning entries into the Page Society and Institute for Public Relations student case study competition. Matt also holds an MS in management and a BS in marketing from the University of Central Florida (UCF). Prior to academia, he worked in business publishing and financial communications positions. He consults for various organizations on training and development, and collaborates with industry in his research and teaching.