With its bright, yellow-bordered covers enveloping a treasure trove of stories and groundbreaking photography, National Geographic is an American icon.

Appointed its editor-in-chief in 2014, Susan Goldberg is the first woman to helm the award-winning magazine in its 128-year history. On March 24, she will be the featured speaker at the Spring 2016 Richard Harwood Lecture in American Journalism, hosted by the C.V. Starr Center for the Study of the American Experience at Washington College.

The program, which is free and open to the public, will begin at 6:00 p.m. in Decker Theatre, Gibson Center for the Arts.

Using photographs and videos, Goldberg will provide an under-the-hood view of National Geographic’s production process, focusing on how new media and digital platforms enhance the magazine’s rich, contextual storytelling tradition. She will be joined onstage for a conversation with Adam Goodheart, the Hodson Trust-Griswold Director of the C.V. Starr Center, who has written several feature articles for National Geographic, including the April 2015 cover story.

Known for publishing stories that make a difference in the world, National Geographic, under Goldberg’s leadership, won two National Magazine Awards and the George Polk Award for Magazine Reporting. In March 2015, Goldberg received the Exceptional Woman in Publishing Award from Exceptional Women in Publishing (EWIP). 

Overseeing the magazine during a time of seismic changes in the field of journalism, Goldberg is also editorial director of National Geographic Partners, the new, expanded joint venture owned by the National Geographic Society and 21st Century Fox that combines the National Geographic television channels with National Geographic’s other media and consumer-oriented assets.

Before joining National Geographic, Goldberg was executive editor for federal, state, and local government coverage for Bloomberg News in Washington, D.C. In 2013, Washingtonian magazine voted her one of Washington’s 11 most influential women in the media. From 2007 to 2010, she was editor of The Plain Dealer, the daily newspaper of Cleveland and the largest newspaper in Ohio. From 2003 to 2007, she was the executive editor of the San Jose Mercury News, and served as the paper’s managing editor from 1999 to 2003. A graduate of Michigan State University, she began her career as a reporter at the Seattle Post-Intelligencer.

Washington College’s Harwood Lecture Series in American Journalism was established to honor the distinguished career of the late Washington Post columnist and ombudsman Richard Harwood, who served as a trustee of the College, as well as a teacher and mentor of undergraduate journalists. The Harwood series has featured David Axelrod, Tom Wheeler, Howard Dean, Robert Novak, John McCain, James Carville, Judy Woodruff, Al Hunt, Mark Shields, and Paul Gigot. The journalistic tradition has also continued in Harwood’s own family; his son, John Harwood, has had a distinguished career as a political correspondent and columnist for CNBC, the New York Times, and the Wall Street Journal. 

The National Geographic Society is one of the world’s largest nonprofit scientific and educational organizations, dedicated to supporting research and exploration around the globe. Founded in 1888, the member-supported Society offers a community for people to get closer to explorers, connect with each other, and help make a difference. The Society reaches more than 500 million people worldwide each month through its media platforms, products and events. National Geographic has funded more than 10,000 scientific research, conservation, and exploration projects and supports an education program promoting geographic literacy. For more information, visit www.nationalgeographic.com.