Raney Aronson-Rath
Raney Aronson-Rath is the executive producer of FRONTLINE, PBS’ flagship investigative journalism series.
She been internationally recognized for her work to expand FRONTLINE’s reporting capacity, reimagine the documentary form across multiple platforms, and report and tell stories that matter in new, creative ways.
From the emergence of ISIS in Syria to the hidden history of the NFL and concussions to the secret reality of rape on the job for immigrant women, Aronson-Rath oversees FRONTLINE’s award-winning reporting on air and online and directs the series’ evolution and editorial vision.
A leading voice on narrative journalism, documentary filmmaking, and visual storytelling, Aronson-Rath pioneered a collaborative model for investigative journalism that The New York Times described as “increasingly important … as a way to reach new viewers and produce more in-depth reports.”
She has developed and managed nearly 30 in-depth, cross-platform journalism partnerships with some of the nation’s premiere news outlets, including ProPublica, American Public Media’s Marketplace, PBS NewsHour, The New York Times, CBC Television and Univision — and has significantly grown both FRONTLINE’s broadcast and digital audiences in the process.
Under Aronson-Rath’s leadership, FRONTLINE has won every major award in broadcast journalism, earned new funding to expand its investigative capacity, and dramatically expanded its digital footprint (including by launching a YouTube channel with original content, and by making a commitment to interactive projects like Concussion Watch, the Emmy-nominated Targeting the Electorate, and A Perfect Terrorist: David Coleman Headley’s Web of Betrayal, which was named one of The Best American Infographics of 2013).
Aronson-Rath's work to translate FRONTLINE’s core journalistic values of fairness, depth and transparency into the digital space was recently featured in “Video Now,” a report by the Tow Center for Digital Journalism at the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism, as well as in the school's "duPont Talks" series.
A 2014-2015 Fellow at the MIT Open Doc Lab, Aronson-Rath has spoken on the future of journalism at the Skoll World Forum, the TV Next Summit, the National Scholastic Press Association’s High School Journalism Convention, Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism, the Power of Narrative Journalism Conference, and at universities including Stanford, UC Berkeley, NYU and MIT.
Aronson-Rath joined FRONTLINE in 2007 as a senior producer. She was named deputy executive producer by David Fanning, the series’ founder, in 2012, and then became executive producer in 2015. Before managing FRONTLINE, Aronson-Rath produced several notable FRONTLINE documentaries including News War, The Last Abortion Clinic, The Jesus Factor, Law & Disorder, and Post Mortem.
Prior to FRONTLINE, Aronson-Rath worked at ABC News, The Wall Street Journal, and MSNBC. She earned her bachelor’s degree in South Asian studies and history from the University of Wisconsin, and received her master’s from the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.
