The Frenken Awards for Excellence in Communications Research
Media Access Canada (MAC) has created five awards to honour new and original, empirically oriented research about Canada's communications industry.
MAC established the awards to honour Joseph ('Sjef', pronounced 'shef') Frenken, a central figure in the development of Canadian broadcasting policy, to commemorate his 75th birthday in 2010.
After obtaining degrees in radio and TV arts from Ryerson and in psychology from Carleton University, Sjef Frenken joined the staff of the CRTC, where for almost a quarter of a century he directed and influenced the Commission's broadcasting policies regarding the CBC, radio, media ownership and other areas. Sjef encouraged quantitative foundations for communications policy, and was responsible for creating new methods of measuring radio programming content.
The Frenken awards will be granted to five outstanding examples of quantitatively-oriented research in the following areas:
- $500 Award for Excellence in Quantitative Research in Canadian Communications
- $250 Award for Excellence in Legal Research on Canadian Communications
- $250 Award for Excellence in Economic Research on Broadcasting
- $250 Award for Excellence in Quantitative Research on Journalism, and
- $250 Award for Excellence in Quantitative Research on New Media.