Kate Smith was a senior editor for MPR News. Smith, a native Midwesterner, has worked in broadcast newsrooms in a wide variety of roles since 1981. Currently, Smith manages and edits daily coverage and long-term projects for the rural reporting unit. She also serves as an occasional substitute host. Before taking on editing duties, Smith spent a decade covering education issues for MPR News. She began her broadcast career in commercial television newsrooms. She covered the education beat and general assignments for KSTP-TV (Minneapolis-St. Paul). There she helped coordinate and produce the station's award-winning coverage of the 1988 Winter Olympic games in Calgary, Alberta. Prior to that, Smith spent five years at WFRV-TV (Green Bay), covering a large portion of eastern Wisconsin. She has won a number of local, regional and national reporting and journalism awards. Smith attended the University of Wisconsin-Madison on a music scholarship for bassoon performance. She is active the Longfellow neighborhood of Minneapolis. She enjoys protecting urban wildernesses as well as striking out to find the truly wild places around us.