Cornelia Dean, former science editor at "The New York Times,” will speak on “Covering Science Journalism at "The New York Times” on Wednesday, March 1 at 3 p.m. in the Bart Luedeke Center
Theater as part of the Rider University Lecture Series.

Dean’s talk is free and open to the public. The lecture is sponsored by Rider’s biology department and “The New York Times.”

Dean served as science editor at “The New York Times” from 1997 until the summer of 2003 when she left the position to accept a fellowship at the Joan Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics and Public Policy at Harvard University. While there, she worked on a book about the use and misuse of scientific information in American life. As science editor at “The Times,” she oversaw the daily coverage by The Times’ science staff as well as the Science Times section on Tuesdays and the weekly health page. Under her guidance, the Science Times kept daily newspaper readers ahead of the game on breaking news stories such as the shuttle disaster, the anthrax threat and SARS. She returned to “The Times” in 2004 as a writer and commentator.

Initially joining “The Times” in 1983 as a copy editor, she previously served as deputy Washington editor, deputy science editor and in various editorial positions in the science department and on the national desk.

Over the years, Dean had also served as a reporter and editor at the "Providence Journal." In addition, she has taught reporting and editing at the University of Rhode Island and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism as well as a technology and public policy course at Vassar College.

Dean is author of “Against the Tide: The Battle for America’s Beaches,” an examination of coastal erosion and land use (Columbia, 1999). She received a bachelor’s degree in American civilization from Brown University and a master’s degree from Boston University.