Pulitzer Prize administrator Mike Pride is retiring

Mike Pride, the chairman of the Pulitzer Prizes, will retire in the summer after three years running the top journalism awards in the United States.

Pride, who is 70, is returning to retirement after a career as a journalist and editor, most recently of the Concord Monitor, according to a press release from Columbia University, which administers the Pulitzer Prizes.

“This job has restored my faith in the future of journalism, but it is time for me to return to my happy state of retirement,” Pride said in a statement provided by Columbia University. “I am grateful to have played a part in the prizes’ celebration of their first century and their passage into their second.”

During his tenure at the Pulitzer Prizes, Pride steered the awards through a number of big changes, including opening up the prizes to magazines. He also guided the awards through their centennial celebration, which included marquee events at The Poynter Institute in St. Petersburg, Florida, Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts, the USC Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism in Los Angeles and the Texas presidential libraries in Dallas, Texas.

Pride also spearheaded a remaking of the Pulitzer Prizes website, Pulitzer.org.

The Pulitzer Prizes will now undergo a search for its next administrator.

Benjamin Mullin is the managing editor of Poynter.org. He previously reported for Poynter as a staff writer, Google Journalism Fellow and Naughton Fellow, covering journalism innovation, business practices and ethics. He’s also reported for USA TODAY College and The Sacramento Bee, and he was editor in chief of The Orion, Chico State’s student-run newspaper. An Air Force brat who grew up around Northern California, he’s still adjusting to the Florida sunshine.