Cynthia Wang is an associate bureau chief for the LA office of People magazine, overseeing West Coast reporting on television and sports personalities. At the same time, she is serving out a mind-boggling 6th year (third term) as treasurer of the New York chapter of AAJA.

Wang graduated from the Medill School of Journalism in March 1993 and started her professional career as a reporter-researcher at People in New York City. In 1995, she became a writer-reporter and two years after that became a staff correspondent. In 1991, she moved to Los Angeles and became an associate BC in the fall of that year.

Among the highlights for Wang at People have been: covering the Sydney and Salt Lake City Olympic Games; being part of the cover team on teen pregnancy that won the Peter Lisagor Award for Features Reporting from the SPJ Headliners Club in 1998; being indulged in working on pieces that touch on her love of 80s, television and football lore; and asking Dan Marino about his acting debut in Ace Ventura: Pet Detective.

As for AAJA, Wang's involvement with the organization began when she received two local scholarships from the DC Chapter that helped her pay for college. Her first national convention was in Washington DC in 1992 and she has attended all of them since 1994. She became an active NY chapter member in 1996 when she was elected treasurer.

Among her highlights in that position: balancing NY's books; seeing the NY chapter become financially strong and able to support its programs; introducing reimbursement recipients to the beauty of computer checks and Quicken accounting; and occasionally holding very large sums of cash, very briefly. When not at work, Wang is, sadly, probably still working. In either situation, she spends an inordinate amount of time caring about reality programming.