Karl Gude

Karl Gude is the Director of the fabulous Media Sandbox in the College of Communication Arts and Sciences, a creative and exciting program comprised of three key elements:

Community: creates opportunities for students from different majors and interests to meet and get involved with relationship building and problem solving activities. Collaboration: expands opportunities for interdisciplinary, experiential learning where students collaborate on real-world experiences beyond the classroom, like helping non-profits, competitions, creating shows and doing professional work. Curriculum: offers a slew of 100 and 200-level creative classes where students can start learning what they love, right out of high school. (Online summer classes are open to all students outside the college.) Gude is the former Director of Information Graphics (Infographics) at Newsweek magazine, The Associated Press, The National Sports Daily and the New York Daily News. He teaches CAS 110, a 500-student Media Sandbox class on creative thinking and problem solving, and his home unit is the School of Journalism.

"I have learned much about the needs and interests of students and I hope to empower them with even greater thinking and making skills, stronger creative abilities and more opportunities for networking with professionals in their chosen field."

In 2017, Gude was received MSU’s Quality in Undergraduate Teaching Award and was also featured in the President’s Report about teaching creativity. In 2013, Gude was recognized with the Faculty Impact Award by his college. Gude has presented at TEDx Detroit, Lansing and Midland and has spoken twice at the South by Southwest (SXSW) technology conference on the “Power of Visual Storytelling." Gude recently gave a talk at the "Political Analytics Conference" at Harvard University and is just wrapping up a National Science Foundation grant where he collaborated with several universities on an evolutionary biology project. Gude is an avid sketch artist, cartoonist and painter who also writes occasionally for the Huffington Post.

Gude is a visual storyteller who has consulted with companies, PR and news organizations, academic and scientific institutions and government agencies, including the CIA, to help them create factual and understandable infographics. During his time working as an infographics journalist, Gude covered major news events including seven presidential elections, wars, sporting events, natural disasters, science, medical and technical advancements and breaking news, such as the attack on the World Trade Center.