Thank you to all of the candidates who expressed an interest in joining the AAJA Los Angeles Chapter Board. Thanks also to our members who participated by casting their votes to move our chapter toward an exciting 2017.

It’s thrilling to see such support for AAJA-LA. We hope to capture that energy in 2017, whether you work with us as a leader or a valued member of our chapter. We invite you to participate more fully with our chapter’s trailblazing programming, including student scholarships and internships, professional fellowships and stipends and our signature Trivia Bowl fundraiser.

Congratulations to the newly elected 2017 board members!

2017 President: Ashley Dunn
2017 VP of Programming: Thomas Lauder
2017 VP of Community Engagement: Annie Yu
2017 VP of Career Development: Cindy Chang
2017-2018 Treasurer: Melissa Leu
2017-2018 Board Member: Mariko Lochridge
[Appointed] 2017 Student Representatives: Nuran Alteir

They will serve with incumbent board members whose two-year terms will continue until the end of 2017:

2016-2017 Secretary: Elizabeth Chou
2016-2017 National Board Representatives: Matt Stevens, Frank Shyong
2016-2017 Board Member: Gita Amar
2016-2017 Board Member: Vacant, after Melissa Leu was elected treasurer

— AAJA-LA Election Commissioners
Elizabeth Chou, Secretary 2016-2017
Belinda Low, Treasurer 2016

2017 AAJA Los Angeles Board

Officers

2017 President: Ashley Dunn  Ashley Dunn is page one editor for the Los Angeles Times. In nearly three decades at the Times, his positions have included metro editor, deputy national editor and science editor.

2017 Senior Vice President of Programming: Thomas Lauder Thomas Suh Lauder is a Senior Data Journalist at the Los Angeles Times, working with data, words, maps and code for both online and print.

2017 Vice President of Community Engagement: Annie Yu Annie is an engagement editor at the Los Angeles Times. She’s a California native who did stints in Washington, D.C., Phoenix and NYC before happily returning to Los Angeles. She’s a fan of coffee, travel and good oatmeal stouts. Reach her on Twitter @anniezyu.

2017 Vice President of Career Development: Cindy Chang  I cover the LAPD for the Los Angeles Times. I started my career at the Pasadena Star-News, then moved to the Times-Picayune in New Orleans, where my beats included city government, schools and special projects. I was the lead writer for a series on the Louisiana prison system.

2017-2018 Treasurer: Melissa Leu Melissa Leu is a digital editor at the Los Angeles Times. She used to work on the digital team at ABC7 and as a reporter at the Arizona Republic.

Board Members

2017-2018 Board Member: Mariko Lochridge  Multimedia journalist based between Los Angeles, California and Tokyo, Japan covering general news and tech. Tweets about Star Trek and boxing.

2017 [Appointed] Student Representative: Nuran Alteir Nuran Alteir is a full-time student pursuing a higher degree in the sciences. She is also a freelance journalist for KPCC: Southern California Public Radio and Los Angeles Times Community News.