Pulitzer Prize winner Connie Schultz is returning to Kent State’s College of Communication and Information to teach and mentor students in the spring of 2016.

Schultz won the Pulitzer Prize for Commentary in 2005, and has been a columnist since 2002. She has also worked as a columnist and reporter for The Plain Dealer for almost 20 years. Even now, Schultz remains invested within journalism since her Pulitzer win.

“It’s a lot of fun and it changed my life,” Schultz said. “It was important to keep advocating; to keep writing about the issues I care about.”

Schultz is a former Kent State graduate from the class of 1979. She was also the former editor of the Daily Kent Stater. When she graduated, she became a freelance writer for news organizations like “The New York Times,” “The Chicago Tribune” and “Cosmopolitan.”

Schultz has won many other awards such as the Robert F. Kennedy Award for Social Justice Reporting and the National Headliner Award for Commentary, as well as the Scripps Howard National Journalism Award for Commentary.

Schultz also served as a public speaker talking about topics including journalism, politics and women’s rights.

Schultz has nearly 139,500 Facebook followers and over 14,400 followers on Twitter. She uses social media to engage in opinion discussions on a variety of different topics.

Schultz will be teaching Feature Writing and Writing Across Platforms in the School of Journalism and Mass Communication.

“I love working with young adults,” Schultz said. “I wouldn’t be coming back to Kent if I didn’t feel loyalty to Kent State. It’s got a great vision and I want to be part of that vision.”