I’m an audio editor and editorial leader based in the Bay Area. Most recently I was the supervising editor of It’s Been a Minute at NPR.

As a reporter, I got my start covering an anti-abortion protest that held a wake for a fetus in New Orleans, which received national attention. Then I moved to the Bay Area where I broke stories about campsite stealing bots and a data dominatrix who controls the digital lives of her clients. I’ve worked in newsrooms at KPFA, KALW and KQED and my reporting has appeared on the California Report, Marketplace and All Things Considered.

The last few years I’ve focused on podcasts and editorial leadership. In 2017 I was cohost, reporter and lead producer for SFMOMA’s Raw Material season on Land Art. For years, I was the main producer and reporter on Bay Curious, which answers listener questions on topics ranging from lumberjack fraternities and buried ships to the history of mental illness in California. As Senior Editor of podcasts at KQED, I managed and edited a slate of podcasts including the arts and culture show Rightnowish, and MindShift’s podcast on the future of learning. I also gave multiple rounds of edits to the housing podcast, SOLD OUT. At NPR, I built and led the editorial team behind It's Been a Minute, coaching producers and shaping the show's direction through a major rebrand.

For a long time, I’ve loved to teach. While living in the Amazon jungle in the spring of 2011, I created lesson plans integrating arts and science. In 2010, I had a short stint teaching English to 3-14 year-old students in North-Eastern Nepal. Lately, I’ve mostly taught audio journalism and have led workshops at the UC Berkeley Advanced Media Institute and spent two years training audio producers incarcerated at California State Prison, Solano.

My last name is pronounced PLAH-check.
My middle name is 梁智媛.

You can find more details on LinkedIn here.