Blogger Bio — Bruce Deckert

You’ve come to the page where I convey my career credentials and a brief life bio, aiming for a healthy confidence as well as a healthy humility. Yes, confidence and humility at the same time — apparently, one of life’s paradoxes!

Thanks for visiting A Slow Life in the FAST Lane — I hope you find your time here worthwhile. 

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SUMMARY OF JOURNALISM CAREER

Today Magazine — Publisher • Editor-in-Chief • Founder

ESPN. com — Copy Editor • Talent-Integration Editor • other roles

Journal Register Company — Sunday Edition Editor, The Herald Press
• Page 1 Editor, The Bristol Press • Wethersfield Post Editor • other roles

Awards — Society of Professional Journalists • SPJ • Connecticut chapter
• For an awards rundown — visit the Today Magazine Contact webpage — in the Meet The Publisher section

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Bruce William Deckert began his post-college journalism career at the Post — not the New York or Washington outfits, but the Wethersfield Post in Greater Hartford, Connecticut.

After serving from 1999 to 2017 as an editor for ESPN. com and ESPN Digital Media, in 2018 he launched Today Publishing, a community-focused and award-winning media outlet that produces Today Magazine and Today Online — covering the heart of Connecticut’s Farmington Valley and aiming to report the Valley’s underreported upside. 

Bruce served as a full-time employee of ESPN and parent company Disney from 1999 to 2015. In October 2015, Disney announced a historic workforce reduction — this layoff was reported nationally and internationally by various media outlets given ESPN’s prominence as the self-proclaimed Worldwide Leader In Sports. From spring 2016 to autumn 2017, he worked for ESPN via a contract role.

More than 10 Today Publishing contributors (including Bruce) have won awards in the annual contest sponsored by the SPJ’s Connecticut chapter — the Society of Professional Journalists is an acclaimed U.S. media agency with the stated mission of being the nation’s preeminent journalism organization. Bruce has won multiple SPJ awards for his writing, editing and design work. 

He has written a book — Serengeti Friendship: Soccer Forgiveness — that is aimed at young people of all ages. The book was chosen to be part of the World Cup Exhibition at the Nelson Mandela Foundation in South Africa.

Born in Newark, New Jersey, Bruce was raised in Bloomfield and Plainfield. His first news job? Star-Ledger paperboy. He graduated from Gordon College (Wenham, Massachusetts) and Plainfield (N.J.) High School.

Growing up in New Jersey, he lived and died with the Yankees and Mets, among other passionate devotions. Bruce has lived in Connecticut since 1988, the same year he married Mina Elizabeth Sykes, a passionate woman of diverse devotions, and a Red Sox fan who grew up in Connecticut. They welcomed their son Luke George in 1992 and their daughter Kayla Anneliese in 1995. 

As an adult — and hopefully still growing — he has fallen asleep often enough during late-night Yankee playoff games. From age 5 through college, Bruce’s home church was Willow — not mega-Willow Creek in Illinois, but Willow Grove Presbyterian in Scotch Plains, N.J.

P.S. Hoop trivia — Bruce played pickup basketball with someone who coached LeBron James once. What is his name? If you want to make a guess in the comments, go for it. Or … welcome to the absurdity of a poll that asks if you’d like another poll:

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In addition to my editing work at ESPN. com, I wrote these three articles:

• Page 2: Prayer and football inseparable

• Writers’ Bloc: Does God belong in the NFL? Does Kurt Warner?
(scroll to the bottom to find my brief essay)

• MLB: Looking back at the ‘disastrous’ All-Star tie

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Summary of Pre-Journalism Career

Crossroads Communication — Sole Proprietor • Consultant
The Master’s School • Connecticut — Public Relations • English Teacher
Raymond High School • New Hampshire — English Teacher

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email — deckertbruce @ gmail.com