We know her as ‘Professor Winslow’ or sometimes just ‘Jane;’ the upbeat, always encouraging, and a little eccentric broadcasting professor. We also know her as the advisor to our campus station, WTOP-10 TV, a featured soloist in the festival chorus, and one of the main organizers of ARTSwego each year.
But what don’t we know about her? Turns out it’s a lot.
“Yeah, I had my little cameos in a few things here and there,” says Winslow. “Acting is an –
interesting business.”
She fails to mention that one of her cameos was on one of the longest running soap operas, “The Young and the Restless.” Always modest, we have to pry the accomplishments out of her.
Other interesting facts about Winslow: she lived in Europe studying to be an opera singer, she’s an award winning poet and documentary filmmaker, and she’s worked as a trainer and product specialist across the U.S. at Entertainment Tonight and Paramount Studios.
Despite her achievements, Winslow would much rather talk about her passions.
“My passion is relating any type of film or production into an artistic expression,” says Winslow, “and how we use that to better our community.”
Winslow uses her company, Jane Winslow & FireDancer Productions, to fulfill these passions.
“I love working internationally, on pieces that address social issues in a positive way,” says
Winslow. “I want people to ask ‘what can we do about this?’”
She credits her hometown of Los Angeles and her upbringing for her strong drive to make the
public more socially aware.
“I’m lucky to have parents who cared about understanding people who were different and that I grew up in an eclectic world in L.A.,” says Winslow.
It was one event in her life that inspired Winslow to make a difference with her life: Winslow
and her father were some of the people who volunteered to rebuild the Watts neighborhood in
Los Angeles after a large, five-day riot that left 34 dead, 1,032 injured, and 3,438 arrested.
“I was so moved by the devastation,” says Winslow, “and seeing my father step forward to help where he was needed was something I really valued.”
Winslow chooses to use another outlet for social activism; the arts.
“I see the arts as a way of making a difference,” she says. “Whether it’s writing, singing,
filmmaking, I approach it in a heartfelt way that reveals issues and problems but in a way that I hope inspires people to work together to find answers.”
It was during Winslow’s time as a graduate assistant at Miami University of Ohio that she
discovered her love of filmmaking could be utilized to make a difference.
“The theatre professor I was working with told me if I wanted to be [the graduate assistant] there was a project I’d have to work on,” says Winslow. “He tried for years to get the project off the ground but the past assistants never got it going.”
That project was a documentary on women who could vote in the first election after women’s
suffrage was legalized in the United States.
“It was my dream project,” says Winslow. “I totally encompassed myself in the nonfiction genre of filming and storytelling.”
That first experience spurred an array of award-winning documentaries Winslow worked on,
ranging from a pilgrimage for peace in Nepal to a program about keeping kids in school that is now used nationwide.
So what brought Winslow to SUNY Oswego?
“I built a whole program at Shoreline Community College [in Seattle] about video production and filmmaking,” says Winslow. “I looked here and I thought ‘wow, wouldn’t it be great to be in an established program and lend a hand moving it into a new direction?’”
Since starting here in 2008, Winslow has felt the support from her colleagues and students.
“I felt very lucky from the get go. I’m working with a wonderful team here,” she says. “We’re
working on making changes to better our department as the industry changes.”
Those changes include developing international documentary classes and the rebirth of the
Hollywood POV course, a program that brought students to California to meet with leaders in the broadcast industry but hasn’t been offered since August 2008.
It’s not the big lights of Hollywood that draw Winslow to filmmaking and teaching though, it’s her students.
“I want to give them the tools to do what they want and need to do professionally,” she
says. “But what I want to do more than anything is give them the ability to find their own voice that will express their own vision.”
Winslow hopes to instill in her students a passion that goes beyond just trying to earn a large
paycheck.
“It all revolves around what each of us can do to inspire ourselves and other people,” she
says. “If I can get you excited about learning, about finding that in everyday life, then I’ve done my job and nothing would please me more.”