See how public media stations across the country are reinventing their approach to email newsletters — from daily flagship products and pop-up election explainers to newsletter courses and Substack experiments. Practitioners from Iowa Public Radio, LAist, Wisconsin Public Radio, and Vegas PBS share what they’ve built, what’s working, and what they’ve learned along the way in a show-and-tell format that lets you see real newsletters in action.
What’s Working With Public Media Newsletters
April 23, 2026
Panelists
Chanelle Berlin Johnson
Chanelle Berlin Johnson, Audience Engagement Director, LAist, works with editors, reporters and the programming team to bring LAist's reporting to social media, newsletters and more online spaces where the newsroom engages with local readers and listeners. She's spent her career as a digital media producer and strategist with a mission to connect people who love great storytelling — from covering politics and elections with Current TV to exploring discoveries in science and technology with Al Jazeera America, and even hitting red carpets to find out the latest in entertainment with Entertainment Weekly.
Madeleine King
Madeleine Charis King (MAD-uh-lin KAIR-iss) is the Newsletter Product Manager for Iowa Public Radio. When she's not writing the organization's flagship daily newsletter, she's supporting the news and music teams as a photojournalist and running IPR's Instagram account.
Brianna Lee
Brianna Lee is senior producer for community engagement at LAist, working to build closer relationships between our newsroom the communities we serve. She’s been at LAist for 10 years, many of them spent on figuring out how to make elections, civics and local government more accessible to Angelenos.
Jenny Peek
Jenny Peek is Wisconsin Public Radio’s newsletter editor. She’s been at WPR since 2017 and worked previously as a news editor and a digital editor. She’s reported deep dive stories on parental leave and child care, she’s a frequent contributor to “Wisconsin Life,” and her story on respiratory illnesses was featured on NPR’s Science Friday.
Autumn Widdoes
Autumn Widdoes is the Marketing Manager at Vegas PBS, where she wears or has worn many hats. She has worked in Public Media for three years and in marketing and communications for eight years. Autumn has experience in influencer marketing, blogging, internal communications, public relations, producing commercial TV advertisements, scriptwriting, crisis communications, and so much more. Before pivoting to marketing and communications, she was an educator at both the K-12 and collegiate levels for eight years. She has been very interested in using new platforms like Substack to reach new audiences.