Taking the Leap

GAMBIER, Ohio (October 24, 2006) The fourth speaker in the inaugural Burton Morgan Lecture Series is Matthew Winkler, Class of 1977, editor-in-chief of Bloomberg News. Winkler will speak on "Taking the Leap: How to Use Your Liberal-Arts Education" on Thursday, October 26, at 7:30 p.m. in Brandi Recital Hall. The event, which will be followed by a reception, is free and open to the public.

A history major at Kenyon, Winkler will be discussing the "leap" that he took in 1989 by leaving a comfortable position with the Wall Street Journal to work for Michael Bloomberg and his fledgling company, then called Innovative Market Systems.

Winkler has led Bloomberg News from conception to full-blown creation. Today, the company has 94 news bureaus worldwide, employing 1,600 writers and editors and filing approximately 5,000 stories daily. The third-largest news organization in the world, Bloomberg News provides global coverage of financial markets and economic and political news to more than 350 magazines and newspapers around the world.

Winkler's distinguished career in journalism began at Kenyon, where he edited the Collegian, the weekly college newspaper, for two years. David Lynn, editor of the Kenyon Review, recalls Winkler as "one of the most serious and professional editors the Collegian ever had. He aspired to higher standards than anyone had held before him, and was able to attract some of the most talented students on campus, like political cartoonist Jim Borgman (Class of 1976). The issues he cared about, he cared about passionately."

Funded by a grant from the Burton D. Morgan Foundation of Akron, Ohio, the new lecture series, which features successful entrepreneurs, many of them Kenyon alumni, is designed to stimulate discussion about the connection between a liberal-arts education and entrepreneurship.