Associated Press Executive Editor Kathleen Carroll will step down at the end of the year.
As AP’s highest ranking editorial staffer, Carroll has led the the organization for 14 years but is retiring in order to tend to dedicate more time to “family events,” according to Poynter.
AP President and CEO Gary Pruitt broke the news to staffers, according to the AP. The search for the next executive editor will start immediately, with in-house staffers getting the first crack at the job, according to Poynter.
Carroll’s team recently won a Public Service Pulitzer Prize for its investigation into exploitative labor practices in the seafood industry. Under her leadership, the AP won five Pulitzers, six George Polk Awards and 15 Overseas Press Club Awards.
Carroll’s Twitter bio describes her as an “Avid cook. Lover of interesting stories and images. Veteran traveler. Lapsed Texan.”
Carroll helped build bureaus in North Korea, Myanmar and Saudi Arabia and led the AP’s transformation from analog to digital, according to the news organization. She is the former Washington bureau chief of Knight Ridder and a former writer and editor in four AP bureaus. Carroll has been the executive editor since 2002.
Carroll will help with the leadership transition, the AP says.