The College of Journalism and Mass Communications is offering the 2022 Seline Lecture Series, which is focused on innovative business models in journalism.

The series will feature three news leaders holding moderated conversations in April. The discussions will explore how news organizations are navigating the business of journalism in the changing media landscape.

The first conversation will feature Sewell Chan, editor, The Texas Tribune, at 2 p.m. April 5, in Andersen Hall, Room 15. Other news leaders participating in the series are Larry Ryckman, editor and co-founder, Colorado Sun; and Celeste LeCompte, chief audience officer, Chicago Public Media. Details on all three chats are below.

The Seline Lecture Series is free and open to the public. The talks will be broadcasted live on 90.3 KRNU and the college’s YouTube channel.

Established in 2010, the Seline Lecture Series engages journalism innovators and thought leaders on challenges critical to the industry. The series is funded by an endowment from the Seline family.

For more information, contact Joe Weber at josephweber@unl.edu or 402-472-3261.

Sewell Chan

“Sustainable Journalism in a Polarized Age”

April 5 | 2 p.m. | Room 15, Andersen Hall

Chan joined The Texas Tribune as editor in chief in October 2021. Previously he was a deputy managing editor and then the editorial page editor at the Los Angeles Times, where he oversaw coverage that was awarded a Pulitzer Prize for editorial writing in 2021. Chan worked at the New York Times from 2004 to 2018, as a metro reporter, Washington correspondent, deputy Op-Ed editor and international news editor. He began his career as a local reporter at the Washington Post in 2000. A child of immigrants, Chan was the first in his family to graduate from college. He has a degree in social studies from Harvard and a master’s in political science from Oxford, where he studied on a British Marshall scholarship. He is a member of PEN America, the Council on Foreign Relations and numerous journalism organizations.

Larry Ryckman

“Here’s why we can be optimistic amid the decline of newspapers”

April 14 | 3:30 p.m. | Room 15, Andersen Hall

Ryckman is editor and co-founder of The Colorado Sun, a digital news site launched in 2018. Previously he was senior editor at The Denver Post, managing editor at The Gazette in Colorado Springs and city editor at the Greeley Tribune. Ryckman spent 22 years at The Associated Press, where he was assistant managing editor, a national editor and supervisor of the AP’s national desk in New York. He spent nearly four years as a Moscow correspondent for AP and helped cover the fall of the Soviet Union and the rise of a new Russia. He also supervised AP’s coverage of the Columbine High School massacre and directed AP’s coverage of the presidential election recount in Florida in 2000.

Celeste LeCompte

“The Future of News is Change”

April 21 | 12:30 p.m. | Room 15, Andersen Hall

Until recently, LeCompte was the vice president of strategy and operations at ProPublica, focused on revenue, partnerships and other strategic initiatives. In her previous roles, she has worked on product development, content strategy and editorial management for numerous media companies, nonprofits and corporate clients. LeCompte previously served on the launch team for Gigaom Research, a market research service specializing in emerging technologies. As director of product and special projects editor, she developed editorial strategy, oversaw consumer sales and managed partnerships with major media outlets. LeCompte was also a co-founder and business manager of Climate Confidential, a crowdfunded environmental reporting project that emphasized collaboration with national and local media partners. She is also an award-winning journalist, primarily covering technology, innovation and environmental issues. Her work has taken her from rural farms in Illinois to factory floors in China, with stories appearing in a diverse range of consumer and business publications, including Bloomberg Businessweek, Outside, Smithsonian, Scientific American, Nieman Reports and more. LeCompte was a 2015 Nieman Fellow at Harvard University.