Leonard Downie Jr. Joins ASU Cronkite School Staff

By: Joe Strupp Former Washington Post Executive Editor Leonard Downie Jr., who retired earlier this year after leading the newspaper for 17 years, is joining the faculty of the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication at Arizona State University.

Downie, who spent more than 40 years at the paper in total, is the third major former editor to join the ASU staff in recent years. Those others include Tim McGuire, former editor of The Star Tribune in Minneapolis, and ex-Sacramento Bee editor Rick Rodriguez.

Downie becomes the Weil Family Professor of Journalism at the Cronkite School and will hold the faculty rank of professor of practice. "He will start in August at the school's new downtown Phoenix campus, teaching courses and working with advanced students at the Carnegie-Knight News21 Journalism Initiative, Cronkite News Service, the Knight Center for Digital Media Entrepreneurship and other new school programs," the university said in a release.

"I am honored and excited about the opportunity to join Dean Christopher Callahan and the outstanding journalists and educators he has assembled at the Cronkite School," Downie said in a statement. "I look forward to working with them to prepare tomorrow's professional journalists at a time of extraordinary change and challenge in the news media. I hope to play a role in ensuring that enterprising and ethical journalism that holds the powerful accountable will survive and prosper in the new media age. As a state university graduate who owes much to public education, I am also pleased to help carry on that mission for a new generation of students at ASU."

ASU President Michael Crow added: "Great journalism is essential to the preservation of our democracy, and that is why we are striving to make the Cronkite School the finest in the nation. Len Downie represents the very best of American journalism, and he will play a major part in creating the next generation of news media leaders."

Downie announced his retirement in July shortly after his paper won six Pulitzer Prizes, its most ever. The Post won 25 Pulitzer Prizes during his tenure as top editor, the most of any editor in history.