Professional Experience
Lead Producer, City Cast, Pittsburgh, Pa.
Nov 2021 — present
Founding audio czar, writer, manager and sometimes-host for the Pittsburgh arm of City Cast, a national team creating newsletters and podcasts to connect people to the places they love.
Content Strategy Lead, Argo AI, Pittsburgh, Pa.
June 2020 — April 2021
Multimedia storyteller and media strategist at a growing global self-driving system developer headquartered in Pittsburgh's Strip District, then testing its technology in six cities nationwide. As a strategist, I worked with colleagues around the world to grow audiences and educate consumers, enthusiasts and investors to trust Argo's approach to safety and look to the company as a consistent leader in the autonomous space. I contributed to internal and external communications across multiple brands and platforms, managed agency relationships and was responsible for most public-facing audio and written content development. Other duties included broadcast engineering, paid and organic social publishing, technical editing, visual selection, finding contributors and video production. Frequently presented to executive leadership and liaised with Engineering, Operations, Recruiting, Legal, Policy, Procurement and Compliance teams.
Editor & Producer, 90.5 WESA-FM, Pittsburgh, Pa.
May 2015 -- May 2020
Writer, host, editor and multimedia producer for Pittsburgh's NPR News station. Launched and led editorial direction of The Confluence, 90.5 WESA's live, one-hour, daily morning news show. Duties included:
Executive Communications Consultant, Grant Thornton LLP, New York City
July 2017 — Aug 2019
Worked with financial and professional services executives to implement company-wide social selling strategies and training, including individual efforts at personal branding and peer-to-peer conversions. Ghostwrote blogs, articles, social media posts, emails, white papers and scripts; recommended sales and employment leads; and helped coordinate design technical needs for events, travel and multiplatform thought leadership campaigns.
Staff Writer, Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, Pittsburgh, Pa.
June 2013 — Feb. 2015
Covered state and national K-12 education trends and policy, blending data-driven analysis with compelling, in-the-classroom accounts. Exposed disparity of state funding among school districts while chronicling student poverty through high school football and the perilous decision-making process for special needs students on the precipice of adulthood. Right to know requests and data mining revealed severe deficits in state construction dollars, a regional spike in teacher disciplinary actions and Pennsylvania’s ongoing charter school boom. Contributed regularly to city government and urban planning coverage, chronicled accounts from violent crime victims and wrote enterprise features as needed.
Education Reporter, The Messenger-Inquirer, Owensboro, Ky.
Dec. 2011 — May 2013
Covered seven school districts among five counties, including four colleges and universities. Dug into superintendent searches, controversial city expansion and the ongoing implementation of Kentucky’s Senate Bill 1 while localizing legislation and serializing the effects of a new accountability system through watchdog-style, data-driven analysis. Picked up spot news and daily features. Increased Twitter followers while integrating social media into messenger-inquirer.com.
Breaking News Reporter | Intern, The Commercial Appeal, Memphis, Tenn.
May 2008 — May 2011
Covered crime, weather, traffic and spot news for the largest daily newspaper in a city consistently ranked one of the worst for dangerous crime per capita. Post-internship, the position was extended to include managing a fitness-oriented blog, freelancing features, weekend shifts, special coverage teams for ARCA races and election-day web projects. Broke the first details on the murder of a former NBA star, chronicled legal battles between a strip-aerobics studio and city government and built a database to cross-reference gun permit holders with convicted felons — all while filing copy for city government, business and courts beats. Worked with a mobile app development team to launch seasonal websites. Tweets during 2011 flood coverage helped catapult the site from an average of 300,000 page views per day to nearly one million.
Editor-in-Chief, News | Sports Reporter, The Daily Helmsman, Memphis, Tenn.
Jan 2008 — Feb. 2011
Directed a staff of 45 at the four-day-a-week University of Memphis independent student newspaper in its most award-winning year to date. As editor, supervised all editorial content, edited and posted web copy incorporating video and custom coding. Earlier duties included budgeting, layout, photography, line editing and reporting features and special projects. Broke two nationally award-winning spot news pieces chronicling victims’ accounts of violent crime and led a successful analysis of administrative evaluations to prove their misuse that subsequently changed university policy. Covered the men’s basketball team through two NCAA tournaments and the revocation of their 2008 season.
Fellow, Poynter Institute for Media Studies, St. Petersburg, Fla.
May 2010
Collaborated with 32 journalists and media professionals during an intensive, two-week journalism practicum to produce a multimedia package about the St. Pete Shuffleboard Club that combined traditional reporting, aerial photography and historical postcards with video and audio clips shot on-site.
Production Assistant | Anchor | Photographer, William Fain Productions, Dickson, Tenn.
April 2007 — June 2009
Seasonal. Coordinated and supervised day-to-day operations as part of an independent film production crew; anchored live from dirt track races in north Alabama for startup web media group WBN7; and created a digital, proof-of progress, photo library for potential investors during shoots in Middle and East Tennessee.
Nov 2021 — present
Founding audio czar, writer, manager and sometimes-host for the Pittsburgh arm of City Cast, a national team creating newsletters and podcasts to connect people to the places they love.
Content Strategy Lead, Argo AI, Pittsburgh, Pa.
June 2020 — April 2021
Multimedia storyteller and media strategist at a growing global self-driving system developer headquartered in Pittsburgh's Strip District, then testing its technology in six cities nationwide. As a strategist, I worked with colleagues around the world to grow audiences and educate consumers, enthusiasts and investors to trust Argo's approach to safety and look to the company as a consistent leader in the autonomous space. I contributed to internal and external communications across multiple brands and platforms, managed agency relationships and was responsible for most public-facing audio and written content development. Other duties included broadcast engineering, paid and organic social publishing, technical editing, visual selection, finding contributors and video production. Frequently presented to executive leadership and liaised with Engineering, Operations, Recruiting, Legal, Policy, Procurement and Compliance teams.
Editor & Producer, 90.5 WESA-FM, Pittsburgh, Pa.
May 2015 -- May 2020
Writer, host, editor and multimedia producer for Pittsburgh's NPR News station. Launched and led editorial direction of The Confluence, 90.5 WESA's live, one-hour, daily morning news show. Duties included:
- Reporting original stories, including writing, shooting photos, designing data components and producing audio content for breaking news and longer form feature pieces.
- Curating content for wesa.fm with news and feature stories from the in-house newsroom, NPR and other content partners.
- Building and managing relationships with reporters across multiple newsrooms.
- Researching, scripting, voicing and editing host interviews, actualities and promo copy.
- Overseeing WESA social media across Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and OTT platforms.
- Advising, story coaching and supporting the station’s flagship series, reporting projects and podcasts.
- Copy editing, headline writing, metadata and SEO.
- Organizing informal learning sessions for interns and fellows.
- Providing technical support for field producers.
- Contributing to state and national newsmagazines and newscasts.
- Producing and engineering local Morning Edition broadcasts and the Criminal Injustice podcast.
- Creating metrics reports and analyses of web posts to better leverage short- and long-term strategic planning.
- Scripting and producing weekly Pittsburgh Almanac and Trending in Pittsburgh spot packages.
- Providing editorial assistance to WESA's News Director and Director of Digital Content and serving as liaison between newsroom staff and marketing, underwriting, membership and various other department directors.
- Participating in membership campaigns and special events as needed.
Executive Communications Consultant, Grant Thornton LLP, New York City
July 2017 — Aug 2019
Worked with financial and professional services executives to implement company-wide social selling strategies and training, including individual efforts at personal branding and peer-to-peer conversions. Ghostwrote blogs, articles, social media posts, emails, white papers and scripts; recommended sales and employment leads; and helped coordinate design technical needs for events, travel and multiplatform thought leadership campaigns.
Staff Writer, Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, Pittsburgh, Pa.
June 2013 — Feb. 2015
Covered state and national K-12 education trends and policy, blending data-driven analysis with compelling, in-the-classroom accounts. Exposed disparity of state funding among school districts while chronicling student poverty through high school football and the perilous decision-making process for special needs students on the precipice of adulthood. Right to know requests and data mining revealed severe deficits in state construction dollars, a regional spike in teacher disciplinary actions and Pennsylvania’s ongoing charter school boom. Contributed regularly to city government and urban planning coverage, chronicled accounts from violent crime victims and wrote enterprise features as needed.
Education Reporter, The Messenger-Inquirer, Owensboro, Ky.
Dec. 2011 — May 2013
Covered seven school districts among five counties, including four colleges and universities. Dug into superintendent searches, controversial city expansion and the ongoing implementation of Kentucky’s Senate Bill 1 while localizing legislation and serializing the effects of a new accountability system through watchdog-style, data-driven analysis. Picked up spot news and daily features. Increased Twitter followers while integrating social media into messenger-inquirer.com.
Breaking News Reporter | Intern, The Commercial Appeal, Memphis, Tenn.
May 2008 — May 2011
Covered crime, weather, traffic and spot news for the largest daily newspaper in a city consistently ranked one of the worst for dangerous crime per capita. Post-internship, the position was extended to include managing a fitness-oriented blog, freelancing features, weekend shifts, special coverage teams for ARCA races and election-day web projects. Broke the first details on the murder of a former NBA star, chronicled legal battles between a strip-aerobics studio and city government and built a database to cross-reference gun permit holders with convicted felons — all while filing copy for city government, business and courts beats. Worked with a mobile app development team to launch seasonal websites. Tweets during 2011 flood coverage helped catapult the site from an average of 300,000 page views per day to nearly one million.
Editor-in-Chief, News | Sports Reporter, The Daily Helmsman, Memphis, Tenn.
Jan 2008 — Feb. 2011
Directed a staff of 45 at the four-day-a-week University of Memphis independent student newspaper in its most award-winning year to date. As editor, supervised all editorial content, edited and posted web copy incorporating video and custom coding. Earlier duties included budgeting, layout, photography, line editing and reporting features and special projects. Broke two nationally award-winning spot news pieces chronicling victims’ accounts of violent crime and led a successful analysis of administrative evaluations to prove their misuse that subsequently changed university policy. Covered the men’s basketball team through two NCAA tournaments and the revocation of their 2008 season.
Fellow, Poynter Institute for Media Studies, St. Petersburg, Fla.
May 2010
Collaborated with 32 journalists and media professionals during an intensive, two-week journalism practicum to produce a multimedia package about the St. Pete Shuffleboard Club that combined traditional reporting, aerial photography and historical postcards with video and audio clips shot on-site.
Production Assistant | Anchor | Photographer, William Fain Productions, Dickson, Tenn.
April 2007 — June 2009
Seasonal. Coordinated and supervised day-to-day operations as part of an independent film production crew; anchored live from dirt track races in north Alabama for startup web media group WBN7; and created a digital, proof-of progress, photo library for potential investors during shoots in Middle and East Tennessee.
SkillsRadio & podcast production
News reporting Team leadership Strategic planning Audience analysis Brand & project management Social media writing Corporate communications Public relations EducationChatham University
M.B.A. / M.A. Food Studies currently pursuing University of Memphis B.A. Print Journalism, minor in Creative Writing/English with Honors, Dec. 2010, summa cum laude |
Awards
|