Overview

Sara Konrad Baranowski is an award-winning community journalist with more than 20 years of news reporting and editing under her belt. A lifelong Iowan, she’s worked at daily newspapers and weeklies, leading news coverage, developing digital-first workflows, engaging with audiences, and coaching new and seasoned reporters.

Experience 

THE GAZETTE•Cedar Rapids, Iowa
MANAGING EDITOR (March 2023 - Present)

• Direct day-to-day operations in a daily newsroom, assigning stories and photos, editing content and drafting coverage plans

• Manage 15 reporters and editors, conducting one-on-one meetings to coach daily work, plan long-term stories and mentor career growth

• Lead planning for Iowa Ideas, an annual conference that presents 60-plus panel discussions about the issues facing Iowa, and solutions to the state’s challenges

• Serve on the newspaper’s leadership team, participating in strategic planning and weighing in on decisions about the company’s direction

DEPUTY MANAGING EDITOR (July 2022 - March 2023)

• Served as second-in-command in the newsroom, managing reporters, planning coverage and editing news for publication

TIMES CITIZEN•Iowa Falls, Iowa
EDITOR (July 2007 - June 2022)

• Led a newsroom of four reporters to publish news, sports and feature stories online and in a 3,000-circulation print edition

• Managed the paper’s digital presence, including a website, which was redesigned twice in five years, and whose traffic grew by more than 100 percent between 2017 and 2020

• Developed plans to engage with the audience through social media, public office hours, community events and a feature that reported answers to readers’ submitted questions

• Reported news, feature and investigative stories through writing, photography, audio reports, videos, slideshows and other digital elements that included interactive maps and timelines

• Produced audio stories for the company's in-house commercial radio station, and worked in the studio as needed to provide breaking new and weather updates

• Served on the newspaper's editorial board, drafting and reviewing weekly editorials

• Managed news content for more than 50 special supplemental publications every year

REPORTER/RADIO NEWS DIRECTOR (March 2006 - July 2007)

• Wrote, recorded and produced daily news for the company’s small-market commercial radio station (KIFG 95.3 FM)

• Reported local news and feature stories for print from throughout the coverage area

• Led the convergence of the newspaper and radio staff through redesigned workflows and training of newspaper reporters to use audio editing software

• Planned and produced the company’s first print/radio news feature series

THE MESSENGER • Fort Dodge, Iowa
NEWS REPORTER (April 2005 - March 2006)

• Reported news and feature stories from an eight-county area in northwest Iowa, for publication in a 10,000-circulation daily newspaper

THE INDEX • West Liberty, Iowa
ASSISTANT EDITOR (June 2004 - April 2005)

• Wrote news and feature stories and took photographs for a 1,000-circulation weekly newspaper

• Assisted with design of the print product, which was a mixture of digital and paste-up

THE GAZETTE • Cedar Rapids, Iowa
NEWS INTERN (January - June 2004)

• Reported news, breaking new and feature stories as a full-time member of the Iowa City bureau newsroom of the 40,000-circulation daily newspaper 

CORRESPONDENT (August 2002 - January 2004)

• Compiled daily cops and courts news from the Iowa City bureau of the Gazette

• Covered events and wrote feature stories as assigned

• Assisted reporters in the converged print and TV bureau as needed

THE DAILY IOWAN • Iowa City, Iowa
NEWS REPORTER (May - August 2001)

• Reported news, breaking new and feature stories as a full-time member of the Iowa City bureau newsroom of the 40,000-circulation daily newspaper 

THE NORTHERN IOWAN • Cedar Falls, Iowa
NEWS EDITOR (August 2000 - May 2002)

• Reported news, breaking new and feature stories as a full-time member of the Iowa City bureau newsroom of the 40,000-circulation daily newspaper 

Education

UNIVERSITY OF IOWA • Iowa City, Iowa
Master of Arts, Journalism, December 2004
Courses focused on reporting and writing, storytelling, editing, media law and ethics, and included an emphasis in political science. Degree work culminated in a Master’s project (a long-form profile of a veteran Iowa reporter who spent 28 years as a one-man bureau of The Des Moines Register).

UNIVERSITY OF NORTHERN IOWA • Cedar Falls, Iowa
Bachelor of Arts, English, May 2002
Major classes focused on English language and literature, with a minor in technical writing. Other activities at the university included playing violin in the university’s symphony, and reporting and editing jobs at the student newspaper, The Northern Iowan.

UNIVERSITY OF HULL • Hull, England
Semester Abroad, Fall 2000

2018 IRE COMPUTER ASSISTED REPORTING BOOTCAMP
Graduated from a week-long class that taught the use of spreadsheets and databases in reporting

2017 POYNTER LEADERSHIP ACADEMY FOR WOMEN IN DIGITAL MEDIA
Graduated from a highly-competitive week-long leadership program for women in journalism

2012 LEO MORES NEWSPAPER LEADERSHIP INSTITUTE
Graduated from a five-month leadership program through the Iowa Newspaper Foundation

Awards &
Honors