Past Speakers

Conferences provide opportunities for professional development, networking and experiencing more of Nebraska as members travel to different host cities and towns. Held every spring and fall, conferences reap the benefit of area history and expertise.

For example, the spring 2025 conference was held in Omaha and included tours of The Joslyn and the Flatwater Free Press (FFP) offices. Speakers included an Omaha World-Herald reporter turned PR person, a business journalist discussing the digital-first environment, and a retired journalist sharing her experience self-publishing a family memoir.

The fall 2024 conference was held at The Crane Trust Headquarters south of the Alda I-80 exit. The morning speaker was a Hubbard Fellow for The Nature Conservancy who gave pointers on enjoying and photographing prairies and other wide landscapes. Afternoon speakers were leaders of conservation organizations who showed maps of their combined efforts to acquire and improve wildlife habitat and public access to outdoor places along the Platte River. They also noted how the media options they use to tell their stories have changed.

Speakers at the spring 2024 conference in Lexington addressed some of the creative ways that individuals and news groups are working to keep the state’s smaller communities from becoming news desserts.

These are just a few examples of how the place that NPW meets influences the program offered. It’s a symbiotic relationship that makes each experience unique.