Cindi Lash ’80, a graduate of IUP’s Journalism Department, returned to the university February 23, 2011, to talk to current Journalism students about her role with Patch.com.
Lash’s visit was sponsored by the university’s chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists.
A former editor at the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Lash currently serves as editor of Patch’s Western Pennsylvania region. Owned by AOL, Patch.com is a community-specific news and information project dedicated to providing comprehensive local coverage for towns and communities across the United States.
Founded in March 2010, Patch concentrates its news coverage on communities that are currently underserved by traditional journalism outlets. Most of the communities Patch serves are outside urban areas, with populations between 15,000 and 100,000.
“We are an online version of your old community newspaper,” said Lash. “Increasingly, journalists aren’t out in the suburbs. We are trying to fill in the patches around cities.”
