PERSON: Judy Woodruff

Host, Journalist

Broadcast journalist Judy Woodruff has covered politics and other news for more than three decades at CNN, NBC and PBS. After returning to the NewsHour in 2007 as a senior correspondent, she now regularly co-anchors the newly redesigned PBS NewsHour.

For 12 years, Woodruff served as anchor and senior correspondent for CNN, anchoring the weekday political program, "Inside Politics." Woodruff also played a central role in the network's political coverage and other major news stories.

At PBS from 1983 to 1993, she was the chief Washington correspondent for The MacNeil/Lehrer NewsHour. From 1984-1990, she also anchored PBS' award-winning weekly documentary series, "Frontline with Judy Woodruff."

In 2011, Woodruff was the principal reporter for the PBS documentary "Nancy Reagan: The Role of a Lifetime."

In 2007, Woodruff completed an extensive project on the views of young Americans called "Generation Next: Speak Up. Be Heard." Two hour-long documentaries aired on many PBS stations in January and September, 2007, along with a series of reports on the NewsHour with Jim Lehrer, NPR and in USA Today.

In addition, she anchors a monthly program for Bloomberg Television, "Conversations with Judy Woodruff." Through fall 2006, Judy was a visiting professor at Duke University's Terry Sanford Institute of Public Policy, teaching a weekly seminar course on media and politics. In the fall of 2005, she was a visiting fellow at Harvard University's Joan Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics and Public Policy, where she led a study group for students on contemporary issues in journalism.

At NBC News, Woodruff served as White House correspondent from 1977 to 1982. For one year after that she served as NBC's Today Show chief Washington correspondent. She wrote the book, This is Judy Woodruff at the White House, published in 1982 by Addison-Wesley.

Woodruff is a founding co-chair of the International Women's Media Foundation, an organization dedicated to promoting and encouraging women in communication industries worldwide. She serves on the boards of trustee of the Freedom Forum, the Newseum, and the Urban Institute. She also serves as a member of The Knight Foundation Commission on Intercollegiate Athletics and the board of the National Museum of American History. Woodruff is a graduate of Duke University, where she is a trustee emerita.

Judy Woodruff is the recent recipient of the Cine Lifetime Achievement award, a Duke Distinguished Alumni award, the Edward R. Murrow Lifetime Achievement Award in Broadcast Journalism/Television, the University of Southern California Walter Cronkite Award for Excellence in Journalism, among others.

-- pbs.org