Steve Drummond
Steve Drummond heads up two teams of journalists at NPR. NPR Ed is a nine-member team that launched in March 2014, providing deeper coverage of learning and education and extending it to audiences across digital platforms. Code Switch is an eight-person team that covers race and identity across the network, and in an award-winning weekly podcast.
Drummond brings to these initiatives more than 20 years' experience covering education issues, and nearly two decades at NPR in a variety of roles. Prior to this assignment, he was the network's Senior National Editor. In that role, from 2007 through 2013, he oversaw domestic news coverage and a team of more than 60 reporters, producers and editors in Washington, DC, and 18 bureaus around the country. In 2012, he also served as acting Senior Editor for Investigations, managing a team of six reporters and producers on investigative projects.
In addition to his journalism credentials, Drummond has also spent some time in the classroom. In the early 1990s, he left journalism temporarily, for a graduate degree in education and a brief career as a middle and high school teacher. His journalism and education interests merged in 1993, when he joined Education Week, where he spent six years as a senior editor and writer.
Drummond joined NPR in 2000 as an editor on the national desk. In 2003, he became the senior editor of All Things Considered. He returned to the national desk in 2004 to edit coverage of poverty and welfare, education, religion, and crime and punishment.
At NPR his work has been honored with many of journalism's highest awards, including three Peabody Awards, two Alfred I. DuPont-Columbia University awards, the Robert F. Kennedy Journalism Award, and the Edward R. Murrow Award.
Drummond's work with NPR Correspondent Laura Sullivan on an investigation into sexual assault of Native American women earned a 2009 duPont Award. In 2008, Drummond edited a series by Sullivan, "36 Years of Solitary: Murder, Death and Justice on Angola," which also earned a Peabody, the Robert F. Kennedy Journalism Award and an Investigative Reporters and Editors Award. A three-part series, "Bonding for Profit," exposed deep flaws in the bail bonds system in this country. The series, reported by Sullivan and edited by Drummond, earned a 2010 Peabody and a 2011 duPont award. A series examining South Dakota's system for handling Native American children in foster care won a 2011 Peabody Award.
Drummond has been a reporter with The Tampa Tribune and The St. Petersburg Times in Florida and at the Associated Press in Detroit. He has written for a variety of publications including The Detroit News, The Detroit Free Press, The New York Times, and Teachermagazine.
Drummond holds a bachelor's degree and two master's degrees, in journalism and education, from the University of Michigan. In the fall of 2013 he was a Ferris Professor of Journalism at Princeton University.
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In its sixth year, our contest handed over the mic to fourth graders for the very first time. We received nearly 2,000 entries from all around the country — and we've narrowed it down to 10 middle school and 10 high school finalists. -
In its third year, NPR's College Podcast challenge received more than 500 entries from all around the U.S. We've listened to them all and narrowed it down to 10 finalists. -
The 2024 national podcasting contest for middle and high school students is open for entries. It will close on May 3. -
NPR's Rachel Martin speaks with Wilco lead singer Jeff Tweedy about his new memoir World Within A Song and how he has found meaning through his favorite music.
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The 2023 national podcasting contest for college students is open for entries. It will close on January 5. -
NPR's Rachel Martin talks with former White House speech writer Sarah Hurwitz about the wisdom she found in an unexpected place: her childhood faith.
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NPR's Rachel Martin speaks with John Blake, who wrote More Than I Imagined: What a Black Man Discovered About the White Mother He Never Knew, about how an apparition of his grandfather led to healing.
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NPR's Student Podcast Challenge received more than 3,300 entries in its fifth year. We bring you some of the finalists in our high school category from students around the country.
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NPR's Rachel Martin talks with the actor Jeff Hiller about how his character on HBO's Somebody Somewhere reflects some of his own personal spiritual journey.
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The 2023 national podcasting contest for middle and high school students is open for entries. It will close on April 28.
