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Making News

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An alumni gift is powering a state-of-the-art television production facility for Seton Hall's aspiring broadcasters

By Christine Franco’s senior year of high school, she knew exactly what line of work she wanted to pursue as a career. Franco, now a sophomore, had enrolled in the school’s audiovisual program, and she’d fallen in love with TV production. “I loved the crew aspect, I loved directing a show, and I loved the logistics,” she says. “There’s such satisfaction in calling a show to black and knowing you’ve had a really good episode. I thought to myself, this is what I want to do.”  
 
Franco, born and raised in Pompton Lakes, began looking into colleges that offer media and broadcasting programs. When she learned about the television production concentration at Seton Hall’s College of Human Development, Culture, and Media, she was sold. When not in class, she can often be found in the John P. and Glynda Gallagher Studio and Control Room, working on Seton Hall University Television (SHU TV), a broadcast network that serves as the voice of student media on campus. The university’s twice-weekly live news show, Campus Nightly, is produced there by Seton Hall students, for Seton Hall students. “It’s a really important facility,” says Franco.  

In the John P. and Glynda Gallagher Studio and Control Room, students produce live and pre-taped programming for SHU TV, a campus broadcast network that offers national news, local news, sports coverage, guest interviews and more. SHU TV's signature show, Campus Nightly, as well as special broadcasts such as "Election Night In America," are distributed on YouTube.

The John P. and Glynda Gallagher Studio and Control Room is supported by a gift from its namesake, John P. Gallagher ’66, who worked in broadcast journalism in New York before moving to Florida and founding his own full-service media production company. Thanks to the Gallagher family’s generosity, aspiring broadcasters like Franco are able to hone their skills in a state-of-the-art facility with all of the latest technical equipment. “Starting freshman year, I was in there touching everything, learning every single piece of equipment, and it was all so new and shiny. We have engineers who are experts in how the studio works and what equipment we need, so that when we go into industry, we know exactly what we're going to be doing. It’s crucial for students in this field to get hands-on experience,” says Franco.  
 
Since May 2025, Franco has served as SHU TV’s social media producer, adapting broadcasts made in the Gallagher studio for Instagram, TikTok, and LinkedIn. She says she feels primed for a career in television news production thanks to her experience with SHU TV. Her schoolwork has benefited as well. “Even before taking my studio production courses, I’d already gotten to do a lot of technical work in the Gallagher studio, so I felt really prepared,” she says.   
 
Franco, a first-generation college student, is already thinking about the job market. After graduation, she hopes to land a position at a network like NBC or Fox and climb the ladder to a role as a producer for a news show. That said, Franco’s dream job is to work on nature documentaries for National Geographic Channel. “I love news, and I love nature,” she says. “I really want to do both. But first I need to develop my news portfolio so I can work my way up and eventually be in those grasslands filming lions.”