Columbus Dispatch names Clark executive editor

The Columbus Dispatch will be led by a female person of color as the paper hires Edwina Blackwell Clark as its next executive editor. She begins on June 27.

Some text from the paper’s website reads:

Blackwell Clark’s rise to The Dispatch’s top job marks her return to newspapers, which she helped lead from 1998 through 2011.

She previously served as editor and publisher of a set of southwest Ohio newspapers, including the Middletown Journal and the Hamilton Journal News. She also worked as reporter and later as an assistant managing editor for the Dayton Daily News.

Most recently, Blackwell Clark served as the communications director for the Alzheimer’s Association of Ohio. She has also worked as the director of public relations for Central State University, one of Ohio’s two historically Black colleges, and as director of marketing and college relations at Rhodes State College in Lima, Ohio.

Blackwell Clark earned a bachelor’s degree in communications from Ohio University and a master’s degree in business administration from the University of Dayton.