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By Hannah Stewart (Comm’19)

In high school, Zoey Georgeades was like any other student: She went to class, hung out with friends, was involved in extracurriculars like yearbook and loved jamming out to her favorite tunes. Except, unlike other students, some of her favorite tunes were her own. Georgeades (Jour’24) didn’t just rock out in her room—she was working with a producer and had plans to move to Los Angeles to start her singer-songwriter career.

And then, COVID hit. With travel, and most aspects of life, severely limited because of lockdowns, she shifted gears and decided to give higher education “the good old college try.” Inspired by her love of music in concert with her background in yearbook—which sent her to the Colorado Student Media Association’s annual J-Day event—Georgeades decided to study journalism at the University of Colorado Boulder. That, along with her minor in communication, gave her a fresh perspective on her passion of producing music.

“It’s been a very interesting time learning to be a musician and influencer while getting a degree,” she said. “My studies have pushed me to improve my communication in general, and that’s impacted my songwriting, making me very calculated.”

During her time in Boulder, she served as the Panhellenic vice president of diversity, equity and inclusion, and joined student media organizations. As a staff writer, and later arts and entertainment editor, for , she has written a variety of stories covering the Boulder music scene. Not only has she been able to connect with and interview musicians, she’s become more confident in herself.

“Hearing what they’ve had to say and go through has been really interesting,” Georgeades said. “Networking and getting comfortable to go alone to concerts to cover them has really broken me out of my shell, which is really important in both music and journalism.”

Her experiences in the classroom have been just as fulfilling—she said it’s been fascinating to learn about the rhetorical and philosophical sides of communication, which have pushed her to think more critically about the messages she puts out into the world and what it means to have integrity as both a musician and a journalist.

“As communication people, we should be the best, but often, we’re the worst,” Georgeades said.

Her network has proven invaluable throughout her time in CMCI. She said Keyana Simone, faculty director of student media, and other professors have always been supportive and helpful sounding boards, giving her the confidence to pursue both music and journalism.

For Georgeades, music transcends language and it, like journalism, is ultimately a tool for bringing people together. She hopes as she moves forward in her career—which she plans to start this fall in Los Angeles—she will be able to create a community using these passions.

“Whether it’s through music journalism or music production, I’m excited to put my all into it,” she said.