Lisa Renze

Lisa Renze is the managing editor of partnerships and projects at Free Press Indiana (FPI), a nonprofit news organization based in Indianapolis. In her role, she works with journalists and news outlets around the state to connect Hoosiers to information essential to their daily lives. Additionally, she coordinates multi-outlet projects designed to focus on larger issues that affect us all.

 

Prior to joining the FPI team, she worked for ten years at Ball State University, overseeing the Unified Media Lab's student journalism teams that produced two magazines, a newspaper, and a nightly television newscast.

 

She spent much of her career as a journalist at The Indianapolis Star, covering educational legislative issues that impacted the state's fastest-growing school districts. She also worked at The South Bend Tribune and other newspapers and speciality magazines throughout the Midwest. Her work has taken her on location throughout North and South America, Europe, Africa, and Asia, and she has earned SPJ, APME, AP, and Hoosier State Press awards. Additionally, she received an Indiana Judges Association Merit Citation for Journalism for fair and balanced reporting.

 

In 2024, she was nominated for two regional Emmy Awards, for her work as writer and director for a documentary about immigrants in the Midwest.

 

She holds her MFA in Creative Nonfiction Writing from Butler University. Lisa is also a proud alumna of Northwest Missouri State University where she majored in broadcasting and journalism, and of Iowa Lakes Community College where she studied English.

 

She is the president of the Indiana Pro Chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists and a member of the national professional advisory committee for the Associated Collegiate Press.

 

In her spare time, Lisa spends as much time as possible outdoors, and shamelessly spoils her adopted dog, Junie.