Arts and Entertainment

Award-winning writers to speak at Foster-Foreman Conference

UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. -- Two journalists who have earned numerous awards for their work will highlight the Foster-Foreman Conference of Distinguished Writers on Oct. 1 and 2 at Penn State.

Each visitor will present a free public lecture, followed by a question-and-answer session.

Dean Baquet, managing editor of The New York Times, opens the conference at 7 p.m. Tuesday, Oct. 1, in Heritage Hall of the HUB-Robeson Center. Baquet leads the editors and reporters who produce the paper’s daily news report. He was Washington bureau chief before becoming managing editor in 2011.

From 2000 to 2007, he was with the Los Angeles Times, first as managing editor and then for two years as editor. Earlier in his career he was the Chicago Tribune’s chief investigative reporter, leading a team of three that won a Pulitzer Prize in 1988 for documenting corruption in the Chicago City Council.

Beth Macy of The Roanoke (Va.) Times concludes the conference with her session at 10:10 a.m. Wednesday, Oct. 2, in the HUB-Robeson Center Auditorium. Macy has reported on diverse subjects for more than 20 years at The Times.

One of her prize-winning projects for the paper has led to a book, “Factory Man,” to be published in June. It is a nonfiction narrative about the globalization of the American furniture industry, told through a third-generation factory owner’s battle to keep his factory going in tiny Galax, Va. Last summer her manuscript won the J. Anthony Lukas Work-in-Progress Award.          The Foster-Foreman Conference of Distinguished Writers, made possible by a gift from Penn State alumni Larry and Ellen Foster, was designed to bring students together with some of the best reporters and writers in journalism. Under the direction of Gene Foreman, the retired Foster Professor of Communications, the conference is an opportunity for students to acquaint themselves with distinguished role models. This is the 29th conference and the fifth renamed as the Foster-Foreman Conference to honor the leadership of Foreman, who has directed the event since its inception in 1999.

Last Updated June 2, 2021

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