The news industry is always changing and adapting. From print newspapers to television broadcasts to social media communications, journalists strive to be ahead of the change. Shannon Caturano, a 2018 Hofstra University graduate, continues to watch how the communications industry advances and strives for success with each change.
“Something I really love about my path is that I’ve had experience with all different platforms. I’ve worked in TV for local news, for broadcast, for streaming, for digital,” Caturano said. “I’ve done some print too and social media, and now I’m doing live news. I’ve loved that I’ve had a mix of storytelling across all different platforms.”
Caturano currently produces for the Wall Street Journal’s Leadership Institute. She works on a live summit where she produces conversations with chief executive officers and business leaders, while other c-suite executives watch from a live audience.
“I get to see live how people are reacting to the shows I produce, which are really exciting,” Caturano said.
Caturano started at the WSJ in Aug. 2025. This new career path was the first time Caturano focused on one topic in a newsroom. She covers all leadership business news to show how big corporations operate. In the age of artificial intelligence, Caturano is excited to report where the future of the business world is headed.
Before taking a position at the WSJ, Caturano worked with ABC News Live, where she produced weekly segments for medical and business news.
“I build those from the ground up,” Caturano said. “I moved over to managing the social media accounts for ABC News Live, so I built those from the ground up as well – we got to 1.1 million followers on TikTok in a year, which is so exciting.”
Caturano learned how to repurpose traditional broadcast stories for every social media platform during her time at ABC News Live.
“Every story works with every platform,” Caturano said.
Not only did she learn the importance of social media storytelling, but she also researched and produced TV stories. One project that she worked on was exploring the impact of social media on teenagers through a 30-minute segment titled “Generation Swipe.”
“Generation Swipe” won the 2025 Dateline Award for Excellence in Local Journalism from the Society of Professional Journalists’ D.C. Chapter. She was recognized in the Television, Business category.
The story followed families who were positively and negatively influenced by social media use. Caturano takes pride in the interviews she conducted that turned into an important story, which can be streamed on Hulu and Disney+.
During her entire career, Caturano had the opportunity to be a mentor to those she produced and wrote stories with. She believes that being a mentor is an extremely important aspect to the development of fine journalists.
Caturano’s mentor during her undergraduate years at Hofstra was her journalism professor, Carol Fletcher. Also being her internship advisor, Fletcher pushed Caturano to complete an internship. Fletcher was there through the whole process for Caturano.
“Hofstra really taught me how to tell stories,” Caturano said. “I covered the presidential debate with ABC when it was the ABC News Presidential Debate with [President Donald] Trump and Kamala Harris. It was so funny because it was a full circle moment – the first story I covered at Hofstra was the presidential debate.”
Caturano came to Hofstra as a transfer student from Suffolk County Community College in 2016 to pursue broadcast journalism.
Caturano felt behind when she arrived at the university.
“I was so impressed with where the Hofstra students were,” Caturano said.
After her first semester, she didn’t feel so behind anymore. She joined HEAT Network by working on Hofstra Today, a student-led news TV broadcast. She did a lot of on-camera work during her undergraduate years, so she was grateful to gain experience with the behind-the-scenes operations post-graduation.
Caturano was also a part of WRHU 88.7, Hofstra’s student-produced radio station.
During the 2016 presidential debate at Hofstra between Trump and Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton, Caturano broadcasted the first Facebook Live that the radio station produced.
Her resume earned her an internship with Spectrum News NY1 during her first semester of her senior year. She was grateful to continue working freelance in her spring semester of senior year. She worked 50 hours a week while juggling her class schedule.
By graduation, balancing her workload paid off because she was offered a full-time position and stayed with NY1 for four years.
At NY1, Caturano worked through the COVID-19 pandemic, where digital storytelling grew rapidly.
Caturano helped create the Spectrum News app with newly introduced push notifications. She enjoyed the rush of racing other news organizations with the newest COVID update. She fell in love with digital news because she saw that the best way to get a story out was through a cell phone.
“If COVID never happened, I don’t think I ever would have been in digital news,” Caturano said.
She saw that the news industry was going to digital anyway, but COVID just gave it the push. In her undergraduate classes, she was introduced to digital storytelling because her professors knew digital news was up-and-coming.
“I’ve always been staying as close to the industry change as possible, and I hope I can still do that,” Caturano said. “I think that’s a big part of my success.”
Caturano majored in journalism because she wanted to tell stories that people could react to and learn about. The first time she wrote a feature story in one of her classes, she knew she would make a difference in the field.
“I’m really grateful that in my career there have been so many people who have trusted me to tell their stories,” Caturano said.
Although Caturano has always been ahead of the curve, she knows she’s still learning.
“Everything feels slow while you’re doing it, but then, you look back and think, ‘Wow, I actually did a lot this year, and I’m proud of that,’” Caturano said. “I hope I get to continue growing in my career.”
Her advice is to always vouch for the stories that are important by going past the headline of the day.
“Sometimes, the best stories are the ones that take longer to tell,” Caturano said. “Be ready to change with the industry.”
