Alumni Profiles
Living for conversation
Pettigrew uses knowledge to teach others
Surratt's career in cable PR wired by a love story
Living for conversation
By Josh Miller
At 19, Lori Carrell BA ’84, already had her life scripted: teach at her hometown Indiana high school, then go to Alaska to teach Eskimo children, continue to graduate school, and finally become a college professor. One by one, she met her goals. Since 1991, she has taught communication at the University of Wisconsin-Oshkosh. But certain things, such as meeting her husband Thom Nustad, becoming a parent of two children, and acquiring a talk show host position, have added meaning to her life.
“Some of the best things are surprises,” Carrell says. “The surprises are better than all the things I could plan.”
Recently, she became the host of a Chicago-based and Total Living Network talk show called Ask God. While enjoying a sabbatical in early 2007, she received an unexpected call to host the show.
“It came out of the blue,” Carrell says. “It was a once-in-a-lifetime fluke. I don’t know why they picked me. It’s like winning the lotto and you didn’t buy a ticket.”
Joel Mains and fellow producer Doug Timberlake remembered Carrell from an interview she did in the late ’90s. Mains said he liked her authentic and pleasant personality. Carrell had experience at Anderson University as a student talk show host, which helped secure the position for her.
Ask God, televised in Chicago and four major surrounding cities, searches for answers to big questions in life. Carrell says the show revolves around street interviews where people are asked what one question they would ask God. Topics have included forgiveness, the purpose of pain, and the possibility of life on other planets. The show’s producers and Carrell listen to these questions and pick one they think would be universal in nature. Carrell takes it from there, with the role of moderator for a group of panelists with varying Christian theological viewpoints.
While no one answer is wrong, the panel looks into the multiple aspects of answers. Carrell tries to lead them to practical conclusions.
Producer Joel Mains says Carrell makes the show more accessible to everyone.
“All her communication expertise is really good when people are trying to wrestle with big issues,” Mains says. “Her expertise challenges the guests to use different words [than Christian jargon]. I think it keeps the show interesting since people are hearing [the issue] in not the same old way.”
The show has presented Carrell with new challenges, alien to her professor job, including managing time on issues discussed and quelling disputes from her guests.
“It’s like a 15-ring circus and I’m managing it and they’re videotaping it,” Carrell says. “I ended up being very nervous, very freaked out, which is good for me because I’ve always been so comfortable.”
She often has to redirect guests as to what the question was. Faced with taping three shows a day — a 12-hour workday — Carrell says it can get overwhelming, especially when her breaks are limited and short. But she says it’s worth it.
The show has gained popularity quickly, going from six million viewers to possibly 60 million viewers in one season.
All Carrell’s experiences have taught her the value of dialogue. “We as individuals do not have all the answers,” she says. “We all need to contribute to the discovery of big answers to big questions.”
Carrell says she lives each day to talk to people. “My very best days are when I have a good talk with someone,” she says. “I’ve traveled and skied down mountains and done exciting things, but the things that have brought the most joy have been in conversation.”
Pettigrew uses knowledge to teach others
By Deborah Lilly
Margaret Pettigrew BA ’90 knows age is no barrier to education. She also knows you’re never too old to fulfill God’s calling on your life. Pettigrew is naturally a farm girl, having been raised on the farm and then living another 61 years on her husband, Floyd’s, farm. But in her heart, she’s a teacher.
Pettigrew graduated from Summitville High School in Indiana in 1936. In her hometown in 1936, men went to college, not young women. So she married and had two sons, Dennis and David BA ’72.
But it had always been Pettigrew’s dream to go to college. Not only that, but in 1955, she was called to be a teacher in her church. She’s been teaching ever since. It was her Monday Bible study students, impressed by Pettigrew’s ability to teach, who encouraged her to pursue her own education. So on Feb. 5, 1980, she attended her first class at Anderson University at the age of 62.
“It was the best thing I ever did,” she says. She didn’t feel out of place, because at that time, she explains, more adults were beginning to go to college.
Pettigrew studied Bible and religion and Christian ministries under Gustav Jeeninga, Fred Shively, Fred Burnett, and Spencer Spaulding.
Pettigrew’s education didn’t stop when she received her bachelor’s degree. From there, she went on to the School of Theology, where John Aukerman has been her advisor. Besides Aukerman, she has enjoyed studying under Professors Emeriti Juanita Leonard and the late Gil Stafford. Today at age 89, she has 84 credits. “I’ve worked hard, and I’ve loved every bit of it,” she says.
Pettigrew isn’t just an alum, she’s also a donor. “I feel that it is so important for every young person to have a college education,” she explains. She only hopes that other people enjoy their time at Anderson University as much as she has.
Surratt's career in cable PR wired by a love story
By Christy (Newsom) Scannell
It sounds like a TV show synopsis: a fresh-faced young man from the rural South climbs his way to an executive position at a New York City-based conglomerate. But for Anthony Surratt BA ’89, who was named vice president for corporate communications at Time Warner Cable in March, his leap from a small town to the Big Apple — with a few stops in between — is an example of the success stories on which he has built his career.
“I had no idea what PR was or what corporate America was,” says the Hillsville, Va., native about his pre-college years. “But once I learned, I saw how important the concept of ‘story’ is in communicating a company’s goals and achievements. And I think my journalism training helps me know how to ask the questions and listen for the stories that will matter to our stakeholders.”
Surratt came to AU in 1985 as a journalism major, but suffering from severe homesickness he nearly transferred to a college closer to Hillsville. That’s when communications professor Holly Miller issued a piece of the no-nonsense advice Surratt came to value from her.
“I whined to Holly, expecting sympathy, but instead received a stern, yet ultimately compassionate, suggestion that I should probably quit complaining and grow up,” Surratt recalls with a chuckle. “I took the suggestion … and am grateful that I did.”
He made another critical decision soon after, heeding Miller’s recommendation to rack up as many internships as possible to build a winning portfolio. The summer following his freshman year, Surratt worked at a community newspaper, a gig he repeated for three summers thanks to partial funding from AU’s Center for Public Service. He also served on the Andersonian staff and as editor. But it was a public relations internship at Saint John’s Health System in Anderson his senior year that was the turning point for him.
“It opened my eyes to PR as a potential career,” he says. “I loved that I could use my writing skills but also get into the dynamics of an organization and use communication as a strategy and science. It just clicked for me, and I never really looked back.”
After graduation, Surratt departed with his bulging portfolio and easily found a job as the only PR staffer at a North Carolina manufacturer. A few years later, he joined a large PR department at an Atlanta-area company, where he enjoyed the collaborative environment.
In 1993, Surratt moved to Cox Communications’ Atlanta headquarters. He started in internal communications, but during his 15 years there “did every PR job in the company,” he says.
“The cable industry has changed dramatically over the years, and as it did I found myself switching hats from employee relations to public affairs to investor relations to government relations and so on,” he explains. “Cable is a very interesting industry to represent as a PR person. There aren’t many industries that have such connections with customers — they use our services an average of 10 hours a day. So people tend to be pretty passionate about their cable and Internet. But cable doesn’t have a great reputation for customer service, which is not completely undeserved.”
And that’s where Surratt’s journalism training and gift for telling a story came in. “Cox was the first in the industry to upgrade the networks and offer high-speed cable and phone service,” he says. “And of course that created more competition, which meant it was even more critical that we get our message out there.”
Surratt’s ability to position Cox in a positive light did not go unnoticed by his boss, who moved to Time Warner last year and later recruited Surratt to join her. Although he was reluctant to leave Atlanta — “I had a great life there and I loved my job” — after 15 years he was ready to move on.
“I was worried about becoming a little stalled and not being challenged [at Cox],” he says, “and I was able to stay in the same industry that I know very well and work for a boss I know and love.”
He also took a significant step up the corporate ladder and could continue work with two charities important to him: Cable Positive, which uses cable resources to raise HIV/AIDS awareness, and the Emma Bowen Foundation, a media internship program for minority students.
But how is the Southern boy who was prone to homesickness adjusting to life in America’s biggest city? “It’s definitely a different lifestyle,” he admits, adding that he enjoys walking to work and exploring what New York has to offer. “But it’s not that different. Your life is where you work and live and the people you interact with, and I’ve still got that.”
He also has a getaway: a tranquil Vermont vacation home he bought a few years ago.
“It does help to have an antidote to city living on weekends,” he says.
Yet as much as he wanted to flee AU for the hills of Virginia as a freshman, these days Surratt is in no hurry to return to full-time rural life.
“I think I could see myself living here in New York indefinitely,” he says. “It was time to shake up the snow globe, as they say, and New York is definitely the place to do that.”
