• Born in Cleveland, Ohio
• Birthday - July 22
• Raised in Lincoln, Rhode Island
• Favorite food: Bacon
• Favorite movie: The Departed
• I Love dogs

Lisa grew up in a small town in Iowa and graduated from the University of Iowa, where she studied journalism and political science. She enjoyed her first five years in journalism working as a reporter at the Des Moines Register, covering city politics, state crime, and the 2008 presidential campaign and Iowa caucuses. She then spent two years as a senior associate editor at Chapel Hill and Durham magazines in North Carolina.  She settled in Maryland in the summer of 2010, and enjoys spending time with her husband and her baby son in her spare time.

Columbia Patch coverage is led by journalist and Local Editor Andrew Metcalf, a graduate of journalism and political science from Boston University. You can reach Andrew by emailing Andrew.Metcalf@patch.com

You can also see contributions on Columbia Patch from Associate Regional Editor Lisa Rossi (lisa.rossi@patch.com) and Senior Local Editor Brandie Jefferson, who leads coverage on Ellicott City Patch (brandie@patch.com)

In addition to covering news, Columbia Patch relies on contributions and news tips from our readers. To post an event in your community, click here. Want to become a blogger? Post here.

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Kym graduated from Westminster High School in 1992. She then earned a degree in journalism from Ohio University in 1996 and a Master's in Publication Management from the University of Baltimore in 2004. She worked in nonprofit communications for almost ten years before taking a break to raise her twins (who are now in elementary school). While home with her kids, she started freelance work as both a writer and a graphic designer. She became a regular writer for several local publications including the Carroll Eagle newspaper and Carroll Magazine. In addition to freelance work, Kym also worked as an adjunct instructor at Carroll Community College and McDaniel College. 

Email: marc.shapiro@patch.com
Phone: 443-379-2140
Birthday: July 3

Marc has lived in Baltimore County since he was five years old and started his journalism career at Franklin High School. As a student at the University of Maryland, Marc covered music for a variety of campus, regional and national publications and websites. After college, he spent two years at the Maryland Gazette in Glen Burnie, covering business during the Great Recession. Before coming to Patch, Marc spent eight months at the Carroll County Times, where his investigations into certain closed-door practices of the Westminster government earned much praise from the community.

Denise is a veteran journalist and native New Yorker who has lived in Owings Mills since 2003. She worked for 20 years for The Associated Press, more than five as the Baltimore chief of bureau. She is also the former executive editor of The Frederick News-Post. In recent years she also has taught at the Philip Merrill College of Journalism at the University of Maryland. She is an avid knitter and quilter.

Email: elizabeth.janney@patch.com
Phone: 410.299.7618
Birthday: May 11

Brandie comes to you from the Chicagoland area via Providence, R.I.  After earning an undergraduate degree in philosophy of science from the University of Illinois, she found she couldn't get a job. Imagine that! So she went on to earn a Master's degree in journalism from Boston University. Brandie has worked at the Providence Journal as a Metcalf Institute Environmental Reporter, as a general assignment reporter and as an online reporter.

She has also worked at the Associated Press, and done freelance for a whole bunch of publications, including AAA (you know that newsletter!), Providence Business News and MassDevice.com.

Now Brandie is in Maryland and is in L-O-V-E with the state -- the diversity, the food (she had her first crab!), the nightlife, the great central location along the Eastern Seaboard. When not tied to the computer, or interviewing folks for a story, Brandie can be found deejaying 60s music at a few clubs around Baltimore; watching a local band; or just out with friends (and talking to strangers) at one of her local haunts.

Brian Hooks is a Maryland native and a graduate of the Philip Merrill College of Journalism. His undergraduate focus was in print journalism, but he also worked at the campus television station and built a multimedia blog on nonprofit media organizations and other experimental methods of approaching the floundering newspaper market. Brian can be reached at brian.hooks@patch.com or 443-569-9718.

Phil Meyer is Professor Emeritus in the School of Journalism and Mass Communication at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and was inducted into the North Carolina Hall of Fame in Journalism in the spring of 2008.  He joined the Journalism School in 1981 and served as Knight Chair in Journalism Professor from 1993-2008.  Prior to joining the school, he held a number of reporter and research positions at various media outlets. 

He has won numerous awards including the 2005 Sigma Delta Chi Distinguished Service Award for Research About Journalism (with Scott Maier). He was named a Fellow of Society of Professional Journalists in 2005. In 2004, the Newspaper Division of the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication gave him its Professional Freedom and Responsibility Award. And in 2000 he received the American Association for Public Opinion Research Award for Exceptionally Distinguished Achievement.

Meyer is the author of several books including The Vanishing Newspaper:  Saving Journalism in the Information Age and Precision Journalism:  A Reporter’s Introduction to Social Science Methods.  Journalism Quarterly in 2000 listed this book as one of the 35 significant books of the 20th century in journalism and mass communication; and the American Association for Public Opinion Research, observing its 50th anniversary in 1996, listed it as one of 50 significant books on public opinion research.

He received his B.S. in technical journalism from Kansas State University and his M.A. in political science from the University of North Carolina.

Steven Berlin Johnson is a pioneer in the web world, as a co-founder of FEED, Plastic.com, and Outside.in, which was acquired by Patch in March of 2011. He also co-created Findings.com, which launched in late 2011. Steven was the 2009 Hearst New Media Professional-in-Residence at The Journalism School at Columbia University, and served for several years as a Distinguished Writer in Residence at NYU’s Journalism School. He is a bestselling author of seven books, and won acclaim and a Newhouse School Mirror Award for his 2010 Time Magazine cover story, "How Twitter Will Change the Way We Live." 

Speaking of Steven's editorial prowess, check out this video based on Steven's book, Where Good Ideas Come From, which was named one of the best books of 2010 by The Economist.

Brian was Editor-in-Chief of Time Out New York magazine before coming to Patch. Before that he worked for a variety of publications both online and off, including Details magazine, New York Magazine, and the old, dearly departed Sidewalk.com. He has written for numerous publications, from the New York Times magazine to Harper's Bazaar. He graduated from Bowdoin College and got an MFA in creative writing at Columbia University so he could put his novel in a drawer with distinction. He lives in Manhattan with his beautiful wife, adorable son, angelic daughter and the world's most dog-like cat. He’s proud as hell of what the Patch team has built.

Ken Paulson is president and chief executive officer of the First Amendment Center at Vanderbilt University and in Washington, D.C.

Previously, Paulson served as the editor and senior vice president/news of USA Today.  He is now a columnist on USA Today’s board of contributors, writing about First Amendment issues and the news media.

Throughout his career, Paulson has drawn on his background as both a journalist and lawyer, serving as the editor or managing editor of newspapers in five different states.

He also is past-president of the American Society of News Editors, the nation’s largest organization of news media leaders.

Paulson also was the host of the Emmy-honored television program “Speaking Freely,” seen in more than 60 PBS markets nationwide over five seasons, and the author of "Freedom Sings," a multimedia stage show celebrating the First Amendment that continues to tour the nation's campuses.  

He was an early advocate of making newspaper content available online, launching online newspapers in both Florida and New York in 1993.

For 12 years, Paulson was a regular guest lecturer at the American Press Institute, speaking to more than 5,000 journalists about First Amendment issues. He was honored with the API Lifetime Service Award. In 2010 and 2011, he served as chair of the PBS Editorial Standards Review Committee.

In 2007, Paulson was named fellow of the Society of Professional Journalists, “the highest honor SPJ bestows upon a journalist for extraordinary contributions to the profession.” In 2008, he  received the Robert S. Abbott Memorial Award for Meritorious Service in Mass Communications from the Southern Regional Press Institute. He has also been elected to the Illini Publishing Hall of Fame at the University of Illinois.

He is a graduate of the University of Illinois College of Law and the University of Missouri School of Journalism. He also has served as an adjunct professor at Vanderbilt University Law School. In 2008, he received an honorary doctorate in Humane Letters from American University.