Doug ’78 and Julie Weisman support the things that matter most in their lives, and Ithaca College is fortunate to be counted among their priorities. The Weismans have established a scholarship at IC and also serve as volunteers on the New England committee for the Campaign for Ithaca.
Doug Weisman gave new meaning to the term “involved” when he was a student at IC. “I tried to take advantage of lots of different activities and opportunities,” he says. “I was involved in the Office of Residential Life for three years: one as a Quad adviser and two as a Garden Apartment resident assistant. I was also on the yearbook staff all four years and was photo editor for two years. And I worked on the Student Activities Board, which was the body that brought speakers and concerts to the campus.”
“[Being involved] opened up lots of doors for me,” Doug says, “mostly by having to interact with so many different people throughout the campus.”
He now uses those highly developed interaction skills in business. Doug is the chairman and cofounder of VideoLink, a company that provides live studio and on-location video production and transmission services for TV networks, corporations, and medical organizations, as well as video production crews, satellite-uplink trucks, and corporate event production. VideoLink’s 50-plus employees are located in Boston, Philadelphia, and Baltimore. According to Doug, six are IC alumni, and the company hires IC students as summer interns whenever possible.
Doug is also the owner and president of Weisman Video Productions, which provides video field-production crews for corporate, documentary, medical, and broadcast productions. The company’s crews travel throughout the Northeast, using both standard and high-definition production equipment. Weisman Video has hired IC students as summer interns and currently employs a recent IC grad.
“The entire electronic communications field was new to me when I ventured from high school to IC,” Doug says. “It truly became a whole new world, and I embraced it and learned as much as I could.”
In the late 1970s—as today—the field of communications was changing rapidly. “It was an unusual time in television; it was a time of new growth and new opportunities. Because the television medium became ‘portable’ during my time at IC, the field of video field production took on a whole new life. Ithaca took that on and provided great opportunities to position us, as students, to embrace the new technologies and challenges in the real world.
“I think IC tried very hard to stay current. This is very difficult in a capital-intensive environment, such as electronic communications. Even so, we had great technology. But best of all we had the opportunity to put it to the test of new ideas and to push those ideas to their limits. I came away from IC with a great practical and theoretical education as well as a new confidence in what would be my career path.”
Today Doug and Julie are the proud parents of an IC alumnus. Their son Alex earned his degree in theatrical production arts in 2006. In fact, it was Alex’s time as a student that led to Doug and Julie’s volunteering on the New England Campaign Committee. “Alex was in his junior year at the time the new campaign got under way, and we found this committee a great way to give back by becoming more involved with the College,” Doug says. “Alex was having such a great time at IC, and we found ourselves there fairly often, so it was an opportune time to help make a difference and stay tightly connected.”
The Weismans have established the Douglas ’78 and Julie Weisman Professional Development Scholarship for juniors and seniors in theater arts to pursue professional development activities. In addition to supporting their respective alma maters—Ithaca College and Dartmouth College—Doug and Julie also contribute to the public schools in their community of Newtonville, Massachusetts. “We see that as a clear way to give back, and to ‘pay it forward’ for our kids—Alex, Daniel, and Leah—and future students.”
Theater arts was a natural fit for their scholarship. “Alex was a theater arts major, and we know how important it was for him to have the opportunity to work in the field while still a student,” Julie says. “We like the department very much, and they identified a need that happily we could meet.”
https://www.ithaca.edu/intercom/article.php/20071127145258952