ALUMNI SPOTLIGHT: LAURIE STERN

After a wide-ranging career telling other people’s stories, Stern was ready to tell her own.

❙ BY KATIE DOHMAN

Laurie Stern (M.A. ’07) has never taken a traditional route with her career, but she’s studied and worked alongside—and featured— some of the greats. She'd gotten her bachelor's in 1983 in psychology, but quickly found that wasn't her path.

Not long after, she began her master’s in journalism and took classes with the legends—educators such as Don Gilmor and Hazel Dicken-Garcia— but then was hired at KARE-11 as a research assistant.

Hired by political reporter Mary Stuckey, KARE’s political reporter at the time (and now a longtime friend), Stern worked at the Capitol and, like many journalists, said her first year was full of “funny and traumatic stories.” Still, she said she loved working there and described it as “interesting, fun, and scary at first.”

From there, Stern said she found herself smack dab in the middle of the “heyday of local TV news,” taking a position at WCCO Channel 4 for the enterprise reporting unit known as Dimension. “It was such a joy and privilege to work with really great people.”

When leadership in WCCO newsroom changed, she was recruited by Bill Hanley at TPT/PBS Channel 2 working on the weekly magazine KTCA Reports. By 1992, she was the news director and helped launch

When the daily news program News Night Minnesota. She also met her husband, Dan Luke, who was a videotape editor. Despite the fact that she was surrounded by smart, fun, creative people—some of her best friends, in fact—she and her husband decided they were ready for a change.

Some people might get a haircut or switch from broadcast to print, but the pair took a fellowship through the International Center for Journalism, which sent them to Russia in 1995 to teach local TV news to the newly independent country. “It was adventure after adventure,” she said. “And Dan and I do really well in chaos.” In 1996, they returned stateside and hung out their own shingle as a production company.

That led to the documentary “Wellstone!” It wasn’t long after the fatal plane crash that she and her husband made a documentary about the Wellstone family’s lives and legacy. “It was so fresh and so painful and all kinds of people talked to us.” At the end of that two-year project, Stern returned to the Hubbard School to finish her master’s.

She hadn’t even received her degree when an offer came from American Public Media, where through the years, she produced stories ranging in topics from poverty to Trump. It was another golden era of reporting for Stern, working on projects that were meaningful and powerful. But when the idea came for Defining Diego, a podcast about her and her adopted son, she dropped everything. It took seven years to get the pitch accepted, but it landed in the perfect place at Sony. The 10-episode podcast, which not only tells Stern’s family story but also dives into the world of international adoption, launched last October.

“There has always been some tension about whether journalists should be in the story at all. When I first started my masters’ degree, the answer was no,” she said. “But there are so many ways that’s changed with the media landscape changing and also the sensibility of ‘What Is journalism?’ and ‘What kind of transparency do listeners and readers deserve?’

“I no longer felt a quandary whether I had the authority to tell this story. I felt honestly that I knew more about it because of my personal experience and my training—and the questions about power, privilege, and agency—questions we wrestle with whether it’s at city hall or with international adoption. Aa Tiko’ [Diego] and I have a lens and the skills to talk about it that I think are valuable, so we did.”

So, now what? Stern’s not ready to retire, but she is ready to mentor and do work that matters. “As long as it’s interesting and pays a little, that’s really all I need,” she said. “There’s nothing I’d rather do. Really.” https://www.backpackumn.com

The Students Behind Backpack

Backpack students come from a variety of backgrounds and academic disciplines. Whether we come from the Carlson School of Management, College of Liberal Arts, the School of Design or the Hubbard School, we work cross-collaboratively to deliver outstanding client work and create a strong community for students interested in advertising, marketing, and communications.

The Work of Backpack

Backpack offers a wide range of services to our clients, like media planning and buying, content creation, brand redesign, and more. Our agency is divided into the accounts team, strategy team, and creative team, so students get a complete picture of the ways that agencies work and get relevant job experience based on their individual strengths and interests. Some of our notable clients include Serve Minnesota, The Toaster Innovation Hub, and the Minnesota Sleep Society.

Creating a Strong Future In Communications

We are proud to be a part of a long Hubbard School legacy of excellence in communications, and look forward to continuing to provide students with valuable work experience for years to come with Hubbard’s support. Through Backpack, students not only develop their professional and leadership skills, but find a true home on campus. Thank you for your support!

A Platform For Professional Development

Backpack isn’t just an ad club, we do real work that translates to real-world job experience. Being in Backpack is not only a way to build resumes, it gives students invaluable networking experience. At Backpack meetings and events, students can engage with guest speakers from a variety of fields and network with our Board of Advocates—a support system of industry professionals devoted to giving mentorship opportunities and career guidance to Backpack students. Backpack alumni have gone on to get positions at Colle McVoy, Carmichael Lynch, Accenture, MSPC, and more.

Continuing a Legacy Through Communications

We were excited to attend the Hubbard Centennial gala, a reminder of the ways that Hubbard helps students prepare for career success and give back to the Minnesota community and beyond.