Wendy Swanberg
Communications Coordinator
WENDY SWANBERG is the communications coordinator for Project HealthDesign. She is a PhD candidate in Mass Communication at University of Wisconsin-Madison, with emphases on First Amendment history and science journalism in the Cold War era. She has a particular interest in journalists’ response to government secrecy, and in the tension between press freedom and national security.
Wendy has spent the past nine years with the UW School of Journalism & Mass Communication as a teaching assistant in journalism and media law, as a research fellow working with the Wisconsin Historical Society, and most recently she helped start UW’s new Center for Journalism Ethics where she edits the center’s website and coordinates all events and publications.
Prior to joining the SJMC, she spent many years as a public affairs producer for WMAQ-TV (NBC) in Chicago, responsible for documentary and studio talk programs. She still does freelance broadcast production, and archival research for Vanity Fair magazine and other publications. Prior to resuming graduate studies, she spent a decade on various land use planning boards in Wisconsin and Illinois.
A native of Chicago, Wendy holds a BA with high honor from DePaul University and an MA in Journalism from UW-Madison. She lives on a small farm outside Madison with three sons, two dogs, and one baby grand piano.
