NPR Veteran Edith Chapin To Lead Newsroom

NPR has moved to shore up its leadership at a time of significant transition, naming veteran news leader Edith Chapin as its senior vice president for news and editor in chief, reports NPR. She has been serving in the position on an acting basis since fall 2022.

"NPR has extraordinary journalists who tell stories and getting to participate in the leadership of that journalism is a tremendous privilege," Chapin said in a brief interview Monday morning. "We all aim every day to serve our audience with information and moments of joy that are useful and relevant."

Edith Chapin

Chapin has helped lead NPR for more than a decade, joining in 2012 as foreign editor and then rising to become executive editor, the effective top deputy for the news division. Previously, she had been a journalist for CNN for a quarter century, working her way up from intern to vice president. As a producer and assignment editor she covered Nelson Mandela's election to the presidency of South Africa, the first Gulf War, genocide in Rwanda and Bosnia, and then helped lead her network's coverage of Hurricane Katrina and a deadly tsunami in south Asia.

"During a turbulent time, she has been a steady hand and wise counsel to me," NPR chief executive John Lansing said in an interview. "Her editorial leadership has helped NPR produce some of the most excellent journalism that we've ever had."

Lansing also cited Chapin's qualities as "her experience in terms of leading our international coverage, her experience in leading NPR's collaborative journalism with our member stations, her day-to-day leadership as executive editor, and her outstanding work as stepping in as head of news after Nancy [Barnes] left."