Adam Van Arsdale, professor of anthropology at Wellesley, invited two of the minds behind New Hampshire Public Radio’s hit true-crime podcast Bear Brook to speak to the Wellesley community on October 30 about storytelling within the world of investigative journalism: Jason Moon, creator and host as well as senior reporter at NHPR, and Katie Colaneri ’10, lead editor of the second season and senior editor of podcasts at NHPR.
For the past several years, Van Arsdale has included Bear Brook’s first season on his syllabus for ANTH 209: Forensic Anthropology, because he believes the podcast explores the challenges of solving a cold case “with the appropriate level of delicacy to the issues at stake.” The criminal case explored in the first season was also one of the first to be solved using the practice of genetic genealogy, which combines DNA testing with family records to determine the relationships between individuals, a topic covered in the course.
At the anthropology department event, Van Arsdale asked Moon and Colaneri about their roles as reporters investigating and documenting human tragedy, and their relationships to victims and their families, law enforcement, and the public. “The reason to tell the story has to be more than, ‘Gee, isn’t this case interesting,’” Moon said. “Ultimately, you’re going to have to reach out to people to do the story right. … You need to tell them who you are and convince them to talk to you for your story. It’s in that moment [that] you need to be able to explain why you’re doing the story to the person who’s personally affected by it.”
“We’re not just trying to entertain people,” he added. “We want to illuminate something about the world for our listeners.”
In an interview after the event, Colaneri said she realized she wanted to make audio documentaries when she discovered the public radio program This American Life while studying abroad in France during her junior year. Three years after graduating from Wellesley, she worked at WHYY-FM, a public radio station based in Philadelphia, for eight years, then moved to New Hampshire Public Radio in 2022. At NHPR, she focuses on longform narrative reporting, she said, digging into the deeper questions of why and how.
Although Colaneri said she is not “drawn specifically” to true crime, she knows this genre works particularly well within the structure of narrative journalism. Criminal court cases have a compelling structure, she said, that have really “captured the American imagination,” especially for podcast listeners.
One of the things that blows me away … is how conscientious [Wellesley students] are … I think that really serves you well when you’re doing any kind of journalism, but especially longform journalism.
At NHPR, Colaneri leads the station’s longform narrative documentary unit alongside Moon and Lauren Chooljian. She greenlights project ideas, listens to initial recordings to give feedback, and manages the team’s day-to-day agendas. Colaneri said her time as president of the Wellesley Widows was a foundational leadership experience that taught her how to manage a team. Before she took on that role in the a cappella group, she “got to see the personal sacrifice that leaders make” and “saw people who were serving in the leadership positions having to make hard decisions, deal with disagreements, deal with conflict within the group, and … still have to perform and be creative together and keep the group cohesion together.” By the time it was her turn to lead the singing group, Colaneri felt like she had the skills and support necessary to keep the community strong.
For Colaneri, Wellesley’s “ancestral network,” both on and off campus, has stuck with her. She became president of the Widows because she was inspired by previous Widows presidents; after graduating, she learned a later president was directly inspired by her leadership. “That’s how it is with everybody [at Wellesley]—there are the people before me, and then there’s me, and then the person after me,” she said. “And who knows who my friend inspired? I love that generational effect, and how it’s such a powerful part of our culture.”
Colaneri, who majored in English and French, believes success as a journalist depends on the skills you bring to the field rather than the subjects you studied in college. Students from a breadth of academic backgrounds—such as sociology, economics, international relations, and more—come with their own unique perspectives. Most importantly, she said, “what you’re bringing is your genuine curiosity about what’s happening in the world.”
Resourcefulness, too, is a crucial skill for journalists, she said, one students definitely hone at Wellesley. “One of the things that blows me away … is how conscientious [Wellesley students] are,” she said. “I think that really serves you well when you’re doing any kind of journalism, but especially longform journalism. You have to really be curious and into that story for a very, very long time.”
When asked about advice she has given to Wellesley students, Colaneri said, “It is absolutely OK if you are not achieving your dream immediately. The joy and the learning is really in that journey getting there.”
Referencing advice given by Ira Glass, host of This American Life, she added, “There’s going to be a gap for a long time between the way you hear something that you want to make in your head and your ability to execute it. That gap is where the joyful work is, and sometimes, yes, also the deep pit of despair. But if you keep going, you’ll get there.”