PROFILE

Independent writer,  editor, and author specializing in arts, culture, education and health care.  Award-winning journalist, author, and veteran Boston newspaper reporter with wide-ranging experience and interests. Covered arts, culture and boldface names for The Boston Globe, city politics, education, and urban affairs for the Boston Phoenix, and health care and politics for Boston Business Journal. Freelance contributor to a range of print and online media, including The New York Times, The New Republic, ARTnews, wbur.org, TheBostonChannel.com. Content developer for Boston-based new media arts start-up.

§   Currently University Editor in the Boston College Office of Marketing Communications.

§   Latest book, The Everything Health Guide to Alzheimer’s Disease published by F+W Media in October 2009.

§   Author of the critically acclaimed Irish America: Coming Into Clover (Doubleday/Anchor, 2002).

§   Adjunct professor of journalism at Emerson College  2007 – 2010.

JOURNALIST

• Freelance Writer and Editor (20 years).  Contribute to range of print and online media. Write, curate and develop content for Boston-area nonprofits including Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center/TheBostonChannel.com, ArtsBoston.org and  Actors Shakespeare Project.
• Staff Reporter, The Boston Globe (11 years). Arts and culture correspondent. Wrote breaking news, feature, enterprise and trend stories. Revamped and co-wrote Names & Faces, Globe’s widely read local boldface names column.
• Staff Writer, The Boston Phoenix (7 years) Wrote  magazine-length lifestyle stories on health care, women’s issues. Covered Boston City Hall, local politics, the urban landscape.  Produced multi-part, magazine-like feature packages on Boston public schools, storefront churches, the nonprofit sector, philanthropy.
• Reporter and Editor, Boston Business Journal (4 years). Launched weekly paper’s health, business and politics beat. Covered early efforts to establish Massachusetts’s universal health care law.

AUTHOR

• The Everything Guide to Alzheimer’s Disease: A reassuring, informative guide for families and caregivers. (Adams Media, 2009).
• Irish America: Coming Into Clover, (Doubleday/Anchor, 2002)  “A fabulous blend of eloquence and anecdote, insight and compassion, candor and wit.” –Doris Kearns Goodwin. “Not only has she explored and delved, she has fashioned a book so beautifully written, so fresh, so informative you might want to keep it by your bed or, yes, take it to the beach.” –Frank McCourt.
• Co-author Contemporary Perspectives: An Advanced Reader/Rhetoric in English (Little/Brown, 1984).

TEACHER

• Adjunct professor, Emerson College (2007-present). Teach undergraduate courses in journalism,  reporting and writing in the digital age.
• Lecturer, Boston University College of Communication. Taught introduction to news writing and reporting.
• Senior lecturer, Boston University Center for English Language and Orientation Programs.

SELECTED HONORS, PUBLIC SPEAKING ENGAGEMENTS,  BROADCAST INTERVIEWS

• Inaugural Recipient, Heights Alumni Achievement Award, from Boston College independent student newspaper. Moderator, John F. Kennedy Library Forum (October, 2006).  Featured author/speaker, Virginia Festival of the Book, March 2007; “Gates of Gold: An Irish American Literary and Cultural Festival with William Kennedy and Friends,” San Francisco (2002); “Beyond the Blarney: Talking About the Irish in America,” New York Public Library (March, 2002).  Guest on Fox News’s “The O’Reilly Factor”; WCVB-TV’s “Chronicle”; WGBH-TV’s “Greater Boston,” National Public Radio’s “The Connection” and other national and local broadcasts.

EDUCATION

• M.S., Journalism, Boston University School of Public Communication
• Ed.M., Boston University School of Education
• A.B., English, Boston College, magna cum laude