July 28, 2015 — Young, enterprising journalists represent the future of B2B journalism, and to honor these up-and-coming editors, writers, and designers, ASBPE created the Young Leader Scholarship more than 12 years ago.

This year, ASBPE honored three B2B journalists at the 2015 ASBPE national conference at the New York University Kimmel Center in New York City. Each of the winners received free registration to the conference and banquet, two nights of stay at the Washington Square Hotel, and a membership to ASBPE.

To earn the scholarship, the winners had to be aged 30 years old or younger, spent at least two years in the B2B industry, and plan to continue in it for their career. In addition, they had to submit bios, essays, and a letter of support from a chief editor or publisher at their companies.

Here are the three Young Leader Scholars for 2015.

• Lauren Alexander recently moved to Denver, Colorado, where she is freelancing for Meister Media Worldwide publications. Most recently, she served as the content editor for American Vegetable Grower magazine, and Productores de Hortalizas (PDH).. She earned her undergraduate degree in magazine journalism at the Scripps College of Communication, Ohio University. Her fluency in Spanish positioned her well for her first role at PDH, where she traveled to Mexico to cover the specialty crop and greenhouse markets and help develop editorial and custom content. She previously divided her time between the two publications, focusing on custom content for PDH, and both custom and editorial content for American Vegetable Grower.

• Jeff Zagoudis is an associate editor at Scranton Gillette Communications in Arlington Heights, Ill. His work can be found in publications such as Roads & Bridges, Professional Remodeler, Professional Builder and Chicago Architect magazines, among others. Jeff received his undergraduate degree in organizational communication from North Central College in 2010, with minors in journalism and broadcasting. He got his start in B2B publishing following internships and other work in college and high school athletic media relations.

• Katie James is an Assistant Content Specialist for UBM Life Sciences. She produces and edits content for the dvm360 portfolio, including dvm360 magazine, Veterinary Economics, Veterinary Medicine, Firstline magazine, dvm360.com and dvm360 for iPad. She grew up in the Kansas City area and graduated from the University of Kansas with a degree in journalism.

About ASBPE
Founded in 1964 as the American Society of Business Press Editors, ASBPE is the professional association for full-time and freelance editors, writers, art directors, and designers employed in the business, trade, and specialty press. The official name was changed to the American Society of Business Publication Editors in 1997, and to ASBPE in 2012. ASBPE has chapters in cities nationwide, including Chicago, Boston, New York, Kansas City, Cleveland and Washington, D.C. Its Stephen Barr Award, sponsored by the nonprofit ASBPE Foundation, is named for one of ASBPE’s more honored journalists, who died of cancer in 2002 at the age of 43. It recognizes individual writing across the Azbee’s feature categories.