Kari Lydersen

Kari Lydersen is a Chicago journalist, author and journalism instructor who specializes in covering labor, immigration, energy and environment stories. She is currently a research associate at the Medill Watchdog Project at Northwestern University and staff writer for Midwest Energy News. She worked until 2009 as a staff writer in The Washington Post’s Chicago bureau, and she previously wrote for the Chicago edition of the New York Times working for the Chicago News Cooperative. Her work has also appeared in People Magazine, Crain’s Chicago Business, The Christian Science Monitor, In These Times magazine and other publications. Mayor One Percent is her fourth book, and she is currently working on a book about the closing of the Chicago coal plants. She has taught journalism at Columbia College, the School of the Art Institute and with the youth program We the People Media. She is a 1997 graduate of the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University and lives in the Pilsen neighborhood in Chicago, where she also leads mural tours. She is a former national champion marathon open water swimmer and has completed an Ironman triathlon and five Chicago marathons.

More at www.karilydersen.com.