Marianne Wolf-Astrauskas
IWPA President
mwolfastro@aol.com

Beth Dugan is a graduate of the University of Iowa and studied writing at the prestigious Fiction Writing program at Columbia College, Chicago. She has been a freelance writer for almost a decade and has written for: Time Out Chicago, The Pampered Chef, New City Chicago, APICS, Think Glink and the MNG along with CBS MoneyWatch, the Spectrem Group, UR Chicago, Venus Zine, Baby & Kids magazine, Fancy Food and Culinary Products Magazine, Reservoir.com, Ducts.org, Salon.com, Open Salon blog, Chicago Collection Magazine, the Banana King, Centerstage and the EDGE Chicago Network. She had performed her work at 2nd Story and RUI:Reading Under the Influence. She tells stories. She would love to tell yours. Check out her website at http://bethdugan.com.

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Lydia Rypcinski’s work as a sport writer, reporter, photographer and publicist has taken her to six continents and more than 20 countries. Her career highlights including being a member of the Olympic News Service at the 2006 Asian Games in Qatar; the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games in China; the 2010 Vancouver Olympic Winter Games in Canada and the 2010 Singapore Youth Olympic Games, and the co-author of two books: “Sports Traveler Chicago” with Anbritt Stengele and “Revolutions 2: The Changing Game” with Donovan “Chip” Zielke. Rypcinski is currently the Membership Services/Marketing and Events Director for the Illinois State Bowling Proprietors Association. She is also the Chicago Tribune contributor and Examiner.com correspondent for the Chicago Bandits professional softball team.

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Lolita Ditzler is currently revisiting the fifties writing a memoir about the seven-year romance that led to her marriage.

She been a member of IWPA since 1984. She is also a member of the Wisconsin Regional Writers Association and In Print, an affiliate of Chicago Writers Association.

She began her freelance writing career as a correspondent for the Rockford (IL) Morning Star daily newspaper. Through the years, she has earned awards in the Mate E. Palmer contests with articles published by newspapers, farm magazines, police magazines, and women’s magazines.

In her home community of Durand, Ditzler serves as the township clerk and the multi-township assessment district treasurer.

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Susan Brauer holds a BSEE and an MSEE from the University of Illinois at Chicago, and is currently the Dean of Academic Affairs at DeVry University in Chicago.

Her experiences as a returning woman, starting out on the road to higher education at the age of 33 as a wife and mother of six, then becoming a successful engineer and manager, an author, and owner and president of a publishing company are the basis for her presentations and workshops that empower women to believe in themselves and to follow their dreams.

Susan is founder and president of the publishing company, Dreamers Tapestry, Inc. (www.dreamerstapestry.com), she published her autobiography, an odyssey of abuse and triumph entitled, Just Keep Dancing which was awarded top honors in the IWPA’s prestigious Matte Palmer Communications Competition.

Susan's experiences are the basis for presentations and workshops that focus on many of the career issues women face today. Her presentations: “Changes”, “Effective Presentations” (aka) “Podium Panic”, “Bringing Your Book to Reality”, “Career and Life Transitions”, and “Just Keep Dancing: The Power of Change” have been well received at various professional organizations, colleges, and universities in the Midwest.

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Suzanne Hanney is editor of Chicago’s StreetWise, sold by people who are or were homeless, after working Downstate, including a stint as “Ronald Reagan editor” in his boyhood hometown.

Hanney graduated from Northwestern University’s journalism school, and then edited a weekly newspaper in Marseilles, which she briefly published.

Next, she was lifestyle editor of the daily Dixon Evening Telegraph. Then she interviewed Reagan’s contemporaries, compiled archives for a special edition and consulted with global media.

She later served as assistant news editor, editor of a new weekly paper, then as a copyeditor at the Quad-City Times in Davenport, Iowa.In Chicago, she freelanced for The American Banker and United Press International.

Suzanne was elected four times to a Local School Council in a Chicago public school. She is Past President of the Illinois Woman’s Press Association and both scholarship chair and vice president for print of the Association for Women Journalists in Chicago.

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Marlene Cook
Historian & Archivist
marcook@comcast.net

Marlene Cook has been a member of IWPA since 1973 and has held every office, except treasurer. She was president for two terms, 1983-1987, and was director of the NFPW conference in 1985. She currently serves as historian. Marlene also served NFPW as historian and has attended 37 of the past 38 conferences.

Marlene started writing after her children were in school and she was haunted by a high school division teacher who told her she’d never amount to anything. She said she’d be barefoot and pregnant and have a house full of kids.

Well, at 30 years old and with four children she vowed that teacher wasn’t going to be right. She went back to school, got a job as a journalist and hasn’t stopped. She’s worked for Star Newspapers, Southtown Economist, Chicago Tribune and a couple of smaller community papers. She was Community Relations Director for the Village of Dolton and was Director of the Dolton Chamber of Commerce. She wrote for South Holland’s monthly village newsletter from 1993 until 2006.

Today she is editor of the First Focus, her church’s monthly magazine and Village Voice, Lansing’s quarterly newsletter. She also writes a newsletter for her 1952 class of Fenger High School.

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Rebecca (Becky) Sarwate began life as the quintessential book worm, poet and diarist, often requiring a childhood push to lay down her pen and novels and enjoy the natural world. Rebecca earned a B.A. in English Literature from the University of Illinois at Champaign-Urbana in 2000. She spent several years working in corporate communications for companies like Carlson Wagonlit Travel, before returning to Northeastern Illinois University in Chicago to earn an M.A. in Literature in 2007. After two additional years spent working in the corporate sector, and a lot of soul searching, Rebecca finally listened to the inner voice that had been whispering a true calling in her ear for most of her life. In 2009, she turned her attention to a writing career, working freelance as a theater critic for Edge Entertainment, serving as the urban agriculture beat reporter for StreetWise and acting as the copy editor for Jettison Quarterly magazine, all located in Chicago.

After receiving first place IWPA and NFPW awards for agriculture reporting in 2010, Rebecca accepted a full-time Web Writer position at Think Glink Publishing in Glencoe. At Think Glink she developed content for celebrity real estate and personal finance journalist Ilyce Glink's suite of media avenues including: a syndicated newspaper column, highly trafficked CBS MoneyWatch blog and social media platforms.

In the Fall of 2011, Rebecca was recruited by Hearthware, Inc., a direct retail marketing firm and manufacturer of home products, to serve as the company's Senior Manager, Social Media Marketing and Head Writer. In this newly created position, she functions as the architect of the brand's social media strategy across platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube and others. In addition, she works as the firm's press contact and is the head writer for the company's television commercials and online content. She remains with Think Glink Publishing on a part-time basis.

Rebecca continues to accept freelance assignments when she is able. In 2011, she received another first place award from the IWPA in recognition of her work as a regular political columnist for RootSpeak magazine in Denver. Another second place award was received for her personal blog posts on the Open Salon platform. This year, she has also published pieces in NewCity magazine and Make It Better, a publication produced for busy parents along Chicago's North Shore.

Rebecca was appointed as the editor of the IWPA's quarterly newsletter, PenPoints, in January of 2011. As an experienced professional in new media, and with the support and vision of IWPA President Marianne Wolf-Austrauskas, she is on a mission to take the organization's Web 2.0 engagement to the next level. In addition to her editorial responsibilities, Rebecca has been charged with expanding and further developing the social media platforms for the Association. This year Rebecca also assumed management for the IWPA's blog, believing as she does, that the traditional newsletter format, website and social media sites are partners in branding, and key to the attraction of the next generation's communication professionals.

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