CHICAGO, AUGUST 29, 2007 — WGN announced today the hiring of Lourdes Duarte as the new general assignment reporter for WGN News at Noon and WGN News at Nine, starting mid-September.

Prior to joining WGN-TV, Duarte worked as a reporter and fill-in anchor for three years at WJBK-TV, the Fox affiliate in Detroit, Michigan. Duarte also worked for two years at WXIN-TV in Indianapolis, where in addition to reporting duties, she launched and hosted their public affairs program “Hoy en Dia” and anchored daily news cut-ins for radio station WEDJ-FM. Duarte has also been a reporter at WHOI-TV in Peoria and for Metro Networks in Miami, Florida for radio stations WLRN-FM and WTMI-FM. She got her start in Chicago working as a freelance reporter for Telemundo.

Duarte participated in the Spanish Language Journalism Master’s program at Florida International University and received her Bachelor of Arts degree in Communication from DePaul University. She’s won several awards including an Emmy Award for her work on “Hoy en Dia” and SPJ Awards for Minority Issues Reporting. Most recently she won an Emmy Award for her story titled “Unlicensed and Serving.”