DePauw Stories

Christine DiGangi ’11 was so eager to get into journalism that she emailed The DePauw’s editor-in-chief during the summer before starting at DePauw University.

So began four years of work on the student newspaper that culminated as editor-in-chief. DiGangi, who was a media fellow, tapped skills she developed at The DePauw to pursue a career as a writer and editor covering personal finance; these days, she is the senior editorial director of The Balance, a personal finance website and one of 14 internet brands in the Dotdash group.

Journalism, she said, “was always part of the plan,” but finding a job covering finance “was very much a right-place, right-time sort of thing.” During a brief and unappealing stint in marketing, she got a call from a former colleague at The DePauw, who asked if DiGangi knew of anyone who might be interested in a writing job at Credit.com, a consumers’ website.

“I said I would actually be interested in that,” DiGangi said. “And I remember being very nervous because I didn't know anything about personal finance, other than my own experiences as somebody who had to manage my own money. And I worried that that meant I was not qualified. But she assured me, no, you'll figure it out.”

She did figure it out, and stayed four years before being laid off and moving to become managing editor at another digital financial publication. About 18 months later, another DePauw alumnus who worked at Dotdash was looking to hire an editorial director. She interviewed for the job, “and here I am.”

Her time at The DePauw “was an eye-opening experience for me” during which “I learned what journalism was. I learned how to do it.” She also met her closest friends and her husband, Matt Welch ’11, there.

She structured her class schedule around her newspaper schedule, especially in the semester when she was editor-in-chief and ultimately responsible for getting the paper out twice a week. “I spent more time in the newsroom than I did in class,” she said.

“My world revolved around it,” she said. “… It was my life.”