"Nightline" co-anchor Byron Pitts, Vox.com Executive Editor Melissa Bell, Time Inc.'s Callie Schweitzer and community publisher Karen Andreas also named to Poynter's National Advisory Board
ST. PETERSBURG, Fla., Nov. 6, 2015 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Rob King, ESPN's senior vice president for SportsCenter and News, has been named a member of The Poynter Institute's Board of Trustees.
Poynter also announced today that ABC "Nightline" co-anchor Byron Pitts; Vox Media, Inc.'s Vice President for Growth and Analytics, Melissa Bell; Time Inc.'s Editorial Director of Audience Strategy, Callie Schweitzer; and award-winning North of Boston Media Group Publisher Karen Andreas will join its National Advisory Board in January.
King directs all newsgathering operations at ESPN and oversees SportsCenter, a role he has served in since January 2014. Just five months into his current position, he was named by Fast Company magazine as one of its most creative people of 2014. Prior to that, he was senior vice president for content for ESPN Digital & Print Media. He also managed a team of more than 200 editors, writers and designers on ESPN.com and its affiliated sites, including espnW and ESPN The Magazine.
"Journalists can be a fairly noisy bunch, but the room goes quiet when Rob has something to say," said Paul Tash, chairman and CEO of Times Publishing Co. and chairman of Poynter's Board of Trustees. "Poynter is fortunate indeed to draw upon his experience and insights."
King, who now serves as chair of Poynter's National Advisory Board, joins the Board of Trustees in January. He will replace Owen Roberts, the chairman and CEO of Capital Formation Counselors, Inc., whose term is expiring. The Board of Trustees is the governing body for the institute.
"Rob King is one of the smartest and most innovative leaders that I've met in the media industry," said Poynter President Tim Franklin. "And he understands every aspect of the business, because he has experience working in print, digital and broadcast platforms. Best of all, he's been a real friend to the institute."
"From the minute I set foot on the Poynter Institute's campus as a student in 1992, I fell passionately in love with its mission of championing journalism and nourishing journalists," King said. "Over the years, I've cherished each opportunity to return to St. Petersburg, to meet new colleagues and, most important, to learn more about our craft. So I'm absolutely overjoyed at this new opportunity to contribute in the service of the Poynter Institute and its Board."
King's three-year term on the 15-member Poynter National Advisory Board is set to expire in January.
Filling one of those open seats will be Pitts, who was named ABC News "Nightline" co-anchor in 2014. He joined ABC in April 2013 as anchor and chief national correspondent covering national news and doing in-depth features for the network. Pitts also reports for all ABC News digital properties. He is the winner of multiple Emmy Awards. Before joining ABC, Pitts was chief national correspondent for the CBS Evening News and a correspondent for the newsmagazine program "60 Minutes."
The advisory board also will welcome Bell, who co-founded Vox.com in early 2014 and became the first person at Vox Media to hold dual titles in both technology and news. She was both senior product manager and executive editor for Vox.com. In 2015, Bell became vice president for growth and analytics for Vox Media. Before Vox, Bell oversaw digital platforms at The Washington Post. She also was one of The Post's most-read bloggers and a columnist for the Style section. Before her work at The Post, she helped launch Mint, an India-based Wall Street Journal subsidiary.
Schweitzer, also joining the board, is the editorial director of audience strategy for Time Inc., where she drives initiatives that expand audiences and increase digital revenue opportunities. Schweitzer worked previously at TIME overseeing audience growth and engagement, social media, search, newsletters, new product initiatives and content partnerships. She is an award-winning journalist, and her work has appeared in TIME, The New York Times, Mashable, The Huffington Post, PEOPLE and other media properties.
Andreas, who was named the 2014 Publisher of the Year by Editor & Publisher, the industry's leading trade publication, also will join the board in January. Andreas is the regional publisher of North of Boston Media Group, which publishes four daily newspapers, four weekly newspapers and eight community magazines in Massachusetts and southern New Hampshire. The largest of her dailies is The Eagle-Tribune, a two-time Pulitzer Prize winner.
Last fall, she was recognized with the Anti-Defamation League's 2014 Leadership Award, and she also was awarded the prestigious Judith Brown Award from the New England Society of Newspaper Editors. This award "recognizes the accomplishments and pioneering spirit of an outstanding woman in journalism from the six-state region."
In addition to King, the other outgoing National Advisory Board members are Emily Bell, director of the Tow Center for Digital Journalism at the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism, and Gilad Lotan, chief data scientist for Betaworks.
About The Poynter Institute The Poynter Institute for Media Studies is a global leader in journalism education and a strategy center that stands for uncompromising excellence in journalism, media and 21st century public discourse. Poynter faculty teach seminars and workshops at the Institute in St. Petersburg, Fla., and at conferences and organizational sites around the world. Its e-learning division, News University, www.newsu.org, offers the world's largest online journalism curriculum in 7 languages, with more than 400 interactive courses and 330,000 registered users in more than 200 countries. The Institute's website, www.poynter.org, produces 24-hour coverage of news about media, ethics, technology, the business of news and the trends that currently define and redefine journalism news reporting. The world's top journalists and media innovators come to Poynter to learn and teach new generations of reporters, storytellers, media inventors, designers, visual journalists, documentarians and broadcast producers, and to build public awareness about journalism, media, the First Amendment and protected discourse that serves democracy and the public good.
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