Faculty

The coordinator of Digital Media in the University of Houston's College of Technology is Professor Jerry Waite. Dr. Waite has been involved in the graphics business since he was a high school freshman at the Don Bosco Technical Institute in Southern California. He enjoyed his high school "shop" courses so much that he decided that he wanted to become a graphic arts teacher so that he could continue to have an extraordinary amount of fun each and every day of his career. Helping students learn the business would be an extra bonus!

Dr. Waite earned his teaching certification and bachelor's and masters degrees in Graphic Arts at California State University, Los Angeles. UCLA was his home during his doctoral studies. He taught graphic arts at the high school and community college levels in Southern California for nineteen years.

In 1993, at the request of the University of Houston, the Printing Industries of the Gulf Coast, and the Texas Printing Education Foundation, Dr. Waite moved to Houston to begin the graphic communications technology curriculum in the UH College of Technology. The program he began in 1993 saw its first graduates in 1995 (from the Minor program) and 1996 (from the Major program). In 2009, graphic communications became a stand-alone degree plan called Digital Media. By 2015, Digital Media boasted over 350 majors who study in five dedicated labs on the UH Sugar Land Satellite Campus and one lab on the UH Central Campus.

Dr. Waite was awarded tenure by the University of Houston in 1999 and was promoted to Full Professor in 2008, and currently teaches most of the undergraduate print-related credit courses in Digital Media. Dr. Waite is active in the Graphic Communications Education Association (GCEA) and has served that organization as Regional Vice-President, First Vice-President, President-Elect, President, Immediate-Past-President; and Conference Host (2004). He is on the board of directors of the Nolan Moore Foundation and serves as the Chairman of the Board of The Printing Museum in Houston. He serves on the graphic-related advisory boards for the North Harris/Montgomery Community College District, Houston Community College, and Wharton County Junior College and is the associate editor of the Journal of Technology, Management, and Applied Engineering. Dr. Waite has received numerous local and international awards, including the Rick Hannemann Service Award from the Accrediting Council for Collegiate Graphic Communications, the Kagy and Hartman Awards from the Graphic Communications Education Association, the Educator of the Year Award from the Printing and Graphics Scholarship Foundation, and two Teaching Excellence Awards from the University of Houston.

Dr. Waite has been married to Celia since 1978 and has three grown children, all of whom are UH alumni.