Email: melissat@patch.com
Phone: 630-430-9814
Hometown: Darien, IL
Birthday: April 10

I discovered I wanted to be a journalist when I was in high school. I had been involved with the school paper at Eisenhower Jr. High School as well, but up until I was about 15 I was set on being an architect. I took Calculus my junior year of high school and Differential Equations my senior year (but that's a different story). I decided that I should pursue something I was sort of good at and would enjoy doing every day. For me, that was journalism.

I was a columnist and a writer for The Blueprint at Downers Grove South High School. I was also the editor-in-chief for The Pony Express my sophomore through senior years. It started as the freshmen and sophomore insert to The Blueprint and turned into its own paper by the time I graduated. I loved taking ownership of the paper and watching my staff grow and take ownership as well.

I just graduated from Northwestern University. Northwestern was always my dream school, and it was truly a blessing to be able to go there. I was in the Accelerated Master's Program and received both my bachelor's and master's degrees in four years. My senior year was graduate school. While at Northwestern, I interned for two summers at Suburban Life in Downers Grove, covering Lemont, Downers Grove, Batavia and Geneva. I also interned at the Indianapolis Star for three months as part of Medill's Journalism Residency program. I was also an intern and a freelancer for a magazine company in Chicago called Content That Works. I was the news editor at North By Northwestern, an online publicatioin that strove to provide multimedia and a fresh look at campus.

As a recent Northwestern alum, I have season tickets and plan to attend most, if not all, of their football games. I also love to read and watch Glee, Friday Night Lights and a wide array of movies.

I feel incredibly lucky to be working for Patch right out of school, and I will be working my hardest every day to provide Woodridge with the news site it deserves.

My Beliefs

At Patch, we promise always to report the facts as objectively as possible and otherwise adhere to the principles of good journalism. We also acknowledge that true impartiality is impossible because human beings have beliefs. In the spirit of simple honesty, we encourage editors to reveal their beliefs to the extent they feel comfortable. This disclosure is not a license to inject our beliefs into stories or dictate coverage according to them. Rather, we hope the knowledge our beliefs are on the record will cause us to be ever mindful to write, report and edit in a fair and balanced manner. If you ever see evidence we failed in this mission, please let us know.

Politics

I'm registered to vote and have so far voted for Democrats. I am left-leaning myself, but I enjoy the freedom to cross party lines when I feel compelled to.

Religion

I'm a Christian. I grew up in the Lutheran Missouri-Synod church and now attend an Evangelical Lutheran Church. I was involved with the University Lutheran Church in Evanston when I attended Northwestern.