Diane Smith and Maureen Croteau to be inducted into Connecticut Journalism Hall of Fame
The Connecticut Society of Professional Journalists board of directors will induct two longtime journalists into the Connecticut Journalism Hall of Fame at its annual dinner on May 25.
University of Connecticut’s Journalism Department Chairwoman Maureen Croteau and television and radio broadcaster and author Diane Smith each had careers that spanned more than 30 years.
Smith is known by many residents in Connecticut for her years as a reporter and anchor on local television stations. She is an award-winning reporter, anchor, writer, and producer. She has written books, is the producer of events for the Old State House in Hartford, and serves actively on a variety of boards, most recently for the Center for Women in Business at Quinnipiac University, where she was an adjunct years ago.
She recently founded Diane Smith Media and is an independent contractor with the Connecticut Network (CT-N).
Croteau is the first woman to lead an academic department in UConn’s College of Liberal Arts and Sciences and is its longest-serving department head. Last year, the department celebrated its 50th anniversary last year and Croteau has been its leader for the past 34 years.
Croteau arrived in Storrs after more than a decade working as a newspaper reporter and editor in Hartford and Providence. When she accepted the position in 1983, the department had three faculty members and a roomful of manual Underwood typewriters on old oaken desks. In 1985, she set up the department’s first computer lab, one of the first on campus. The department now has eight full-time faculty members, including two Pulitzer Prize winners, serving more than 200 undergraduate majors and pre-majors. Under her direction, the department has become the only nationally accredited journalism program in New England.
Since 1991, Croteau has been a director at The Day, where Publisher Gary Ferrugia calls her, “the conscience of the company in all matters regarding journalism.”
She is a UConn alumna and a graduate of the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism. She is co-author of two books, and was the 2014 New England Journalism Educator of the Year, chosen by the New England Newspaper and Press Association.
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