On October 8, 2025, Klein College of Media and Communication at Temple University announced the launch of the new sports media major. Housed within Klein College’s Claire Smith Center for Sports Media and directed by Assistant Professor of Instruction Lauren Bullock, STH ‘03, the new major will prepare students for a diverse range of sports media careers.
Many bright minds within Klein College’s faculty teach classes for the new major and have all found homes in sports media.
John DiCarlo, KLN ‘98
Managing director of student media and the Claire Smith Center
DiCarlo teaches two classes within the sports media major: Sports Writing and Advanced Sports Reporting.
While attending Klein College, DiCarlo tried out many reporting subjects. Sports, however, had a unique appeal to him. He was a sports fan his entire life and found that producing articles on the topic gave him a new perspective.
“What I enjoyed most about it was realizing I have so much more to learn about how games are played, how games are coached,” said DiCarlo. “What players, coaches, people and athletic programs are dealing with on the field, and off the field. There’s never a shortage of storylines.”
During this period, DiCarlo interned for the Philadelphia Eagles’ website, producing online news content, and freelanced for local newspapers, covering high school sports. Before coming back as a student media advisor, he was a sports reporter for The Daily Journal.
“You just keep learning,” said DiCarlo. “You learn how to build relationships. You learn how college sports grow, how pro sports grow. There are always areas where you’re just like, wow, I have to learn more about this.”
DiCarlo believes that Klein College is the perfect fit for the sports media major. It boasts alumni like Breland Moore, KLN ‘14, at Fox 29 and Kevin Negandhi, KLN ‘98, on ESPN, and being in the heart of a sports city like Philadelphia, there’s a plethora of opportunities for students. The next step was to formalize an actual sports media major.
DiCarlo hopes that this major will help students place sports in a larger context. To him, reporting on sports is not just about sharing statistics, wins and losses. Sports must be considered within a larger cultural context, especially now.
“You have the intersection of sports, culture, gender, race and identity, and there’s no longer a separation of that,” DiCarlo explained. “Athletes are talking more about that, and we want to teach our students how to cover, decipher and understand that, and take it beyond just hot takes on the Eagles.”
DiCarlo hopes that the sports media major continues to grow and flourish. He wants students to receive an education that is specific to Klein College and its surrounding communities.
“We want to be able to look around at our local, regional and national peers, and, not only that we’re doing what they’re doing, but that we’re doing it better, and in our own unique way that’s special to Temple,” said DiCarlo. “If you come here, you get a special experience.”
Matt Fine
Associate Professor of Practice
Fine is the creator and executive producer for TUTV – Temple University Television’s OwlSports Update and teaches its corresponding class.
Before coming to Klein College, Fine was an anchor sports reporter for 12 years at NBC Sports Philadelphia. He was also an athlete in college, and his father played professional baseball, so he always felt naturally drawn to the sports world.
“News was a little bit too serious and at times a little bit too dry for me…I love sports, and just one thing led to another,” said Fine. “A door opened up here, and I got a bit lucky there, and ended up in sports. And I was much happier talking with athletes about wins and losses than anything.”
Fine appreciates how versatile the sports media major is. It’s not just for sports journalists, but for those who are interested in other media professions, like production, public relations and advertising.
Fine’s class is a production practicum where students are actually producing OwlSports Update for TUTV. He tries to structure it like a broadcast newsroom, giving students valuable, hands-on experience.
“[They’re getting] what it’s like to be in live TV production, the deadlines, the pressure, the excitement of it all, the thrill of victory and the agony of defeat,” said Fine.
Similar to DiCarlo, Fine believes that it’s important for students to understand the larger impacts sports can have. He tries to instill in his lessons the idea that sports can lead society’s changes and interests. Jackie Robinson breaking the color barrier, Billie Jean King coming out as gay and Magic Johnson destigmatizing AIDs were all sports moments.
“Sports seems to be the leader for change. Or, at least when it comes to acknowledging the different facets of society and the important issues in society, sports are always there,” explained Fine. “Being able to teach it, produce content for it, understand it, it just seems like something that Klein is perfectly positioned for.”
Ali Castellini
Associate Professor of Instruction
In fall 2025, Castellini will teach Sports in London through Klein College Global Opportunities.
The class will focus on how global markets report on sports, international and American domestic, and students will have the opportunity to study in London over fall break. Major League Baseball, the National Basketball Association and the National Football League have all made investments internationally, whether that be just growing their fan base or even playing games abroad. Castellini believes that now more than never is a class like this important.
“If we want our sports media students to have the best skills and be the most competitive and relevant, then they’ve got to be able to figure out what the differences are in these international sports,” explained Castellini. “How are American sports being presented and executed in foreign countries?”
Castellini’s career prior to Klein College actually wasn’t sports media but the music industry. Though she wanted to get into sports journalism, sexism, like what Professor Claire Smith, KLN ‘79, faced in the past, prevented her from entering the industry.
“Working in various newsrooms, it was not a great experience for a woman back in those days. It was really, fairly disgusting,” said Castellini. “It was not inhabitable, and I did not have the kind of strength, nor the insight, that somebody like the amazing Claire Smith had, and continues to have.”
However, Castellini took advantage of the lack of care women in sports were treated with. She only fell further in love with the industry.
“Title IX really hadn’t proliferated much when I was in college, so most of the women's sports were club sports,” Castellini explained. “So, the benefit for me, though, is that I got to play a lot of sports because it was low cost, which made me even more of a sports nut.”
Once arriving at Klein College, Castellini was approached by a student, Erin Steffe, KLN ‘19, to help create the Sports Media Society for Women at Temple University. Both she and the student, now a production manager at CBS Sports HQ, felt that there needed to be more opportunities for women in sports media.
Castellini hopes that the sports media major will help increase opportunities for all types of students to access the industry. Though she wishes she could’ve been on that career path herself, she is more excited about making it better.
“I would have loved to have been able to be involved in sports journalism, but the important thing is, oh my God, look at how we’re going to impact the industry. With all these awesome people coming up that have the integrity and have the value system and the work ethic, it’s only going to make the industry better,” Castellini said. “It’s going to make the coverage better. It’s going to help so many more people be able to engage and understand and enjoy the industry. There’s no going back, but that’s the great thing about Temple. It’s constantly moving forward.”
Castellini knows that the new sports major will only aid Klein College students in their careers. This will give recognition to all of the hard work they do on a daily basis.
“Having this major helps support students even more by giving validation,” said Castellini. “You’ve been doing all these sports programs, creating and managing all this content and learning how to manage the operations of sports. Giving them a title of a degree helps set them apart from all the other people that are out there that they’re competing against for jobs.”