Case Study: Katherine Reynolds Lewis

By Made­line Pap­cun | UConn Jour­nal­ism
April 2024

Kather­ine Reynolds Lewis believes when her son was born 19 years ago, the news indus­try was “much worse than it is now” at accom­mo­dat­ing work­ing moth­ers. 

“I lit­er­al­ly would have col­leagues say­ing, ‘Thanks for stop­ping by today, Kather­ine,’ when I left at 5 p.m.,” Lewis said in a phone inter­view in Octo­ber 2023. 

Lewis was once explic­it­ly told by anoth­er col­league that a per­son “can­not be a good par­ent and also a jour­nal­ist,” she recalled.

In the ear­ly 2000s, Lewis found the “gen­er­al news­room cul­ture was not con­ducive to par­ent­ing.” As a nation­al reporter for Bloomberg from 1998 to 2002, Lewis cov­ered finan­cial and com­modi­ties pol­i­cy and reg­u­la­tors like the USDA and Con­gress, and also media and tele­com pol­i­cy. 

Lewis saw very few moms at Bloomberg, and the ones that were there were always “stretched so thin,” she said. At a time when Lewis her­self was con­sid­er­ing hav­ing kids, this wasn’t an appeal­ing future. Lewis was also grow­ing tired of writ­ing sto­ries where “the goal was to beat the com­pe­ti­tion by 10 to 20 min­utes.” 

She was look­ing to move into more enter­prise report­ing, and got the oppor­tu­ni­ty to do so at New­house News Ser­vice from March 2003 to Novem­ber 2008. At New­house, she was a nation­al cor­re­spon­dent cov­er­ing mon­ey, work, and fam­i­ly issues, mean­ing her work was most­ly enter­prise, fea­tures and news analy­sis — or, as she explained it, “not just say­ing ‘this hap­pened.’”

“It was a real­ly great fit to not be in break­ing news,” she said. Lewis thought this was the job she would retire from. It’s also where she dis­cov­ered some work-life bal­ance. She could plan around her kids — in a more enter­prise-focused role, Lewis could man­age her sched­ule to meet dead­lines and get to day­care pick up on time. 

At first, Lewis still not­ed she was the “only per­son leav­ing at 5 p.m.” 

How­ev­er in Sum­mer 2008, her bureau chief warned that “every­one need­ed a ‘Plan B’.” Even­tu­al­ly the entire bureau was closed. Lewis was laid off, with a 4‑year-old son and a 2‑year-old daugh­ter at home. 

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As scary as it was, Lewis not­ed los­ing this job was a turn­ing point. Since Novem­ber 2008, Lewis has worked as an inde­pen­dent jour­nal­ist. She no longer has to hear com­ments about when she leaves the office — her sched­ule is now up to her. 

Lewis makes a good liv­ing through free­lanc­ing report­ing and speak­ing engage­ments. She wrote a book in 2018. In sum­mer 2022, she co-found­ed the Insti­tute for Inde­pen­dent Jour­nal­ists. 

The Insti­tute for Inde­pen­dent Jour­nal­ists — IIJ, for short —  is “an edu­ca­tion, pro­fes­sion­al devel­op­ment, and mutu­al sup­port orga­ni­za­tion for inde­pen­dent jour­nal­ists, focus­ing on Black, Indige­nous and peo­ple of col­or,” accord­ing to their LinkedIn page. Their mis­sion is “finan­cial and emo­tion­al sus­tain­abil­i­ty for inde­pen­dent jour­nal­ists of col­or, through com­mu­ni­ty learn­ing, inno­va­tion and advo­ca­cy.” 

For Lewis, the IIJ is at its core a place to learn new things and share strate­gies and resources. 

“It’s a source of shared wis­dom in the com­mu­ni­ty of inde­pen­dent jour­nal­ists,” she said. “We need to pool our wis­dom.” 

Lewis said she is able to free­lance as a career by mak­ing sure any project she takes on encom­pass­es one of the fol­low­ing: pay, pas­sion, or ful­fill­ment. 

Lewis not­ed she likes being inde­pen­dent because she gets to decide her pri­or­i­ties her­self — espe­cial­ly in regards to man­ag­ing her home life with her kids and her work sched­ule. 

“Inde­pen­dent doesn’t mean home and work nev­er con­flict,” Lewis said. “But it does mean I can decide what to pri­or­i­tize.”