Karen Unland

Karen Unland

Editor-in-Chief

She/Her

Karen is the co-founder of Taproot Publishing Inc. and the Alberta Podcast Network. She previously worked as a reporter and editor for 14 years at the Edmonton Journal before leaving the newsroom in 2011 to start a consulting business and teach journalism.

Karen has a Masters in Journalism from Carleton University and attended the beat business training program at CUNY's Tow-Knight Center for Entrepreneurial Journalism in the summer of 2015.


Recent work by Karen

headlines

Headlines: June 19, 2026

Edmonton leaders react to tougher bail and sentencing; FlixBus launches round-trips from Edmonton to Jasper; All Weather at Home unveils massive solar array

health city council

Council allocates $925K for winter day spaces

Edmonton city council has voted to fund daytime shelter spaces for another winter after a city report found that more than 6,600 people visited such spaces last season.

arts

Strong showing for Edmonton writers at Alberta Literary Awards

Several Edmontonians were among the honorees at the Alberta Literary Awards, presented by the Writers Guild of Alberta on June 5.

health

Crisis diversion dashboard shows patterns of response

A group of social agencies has released the pilot version of a dashboard to track responses to crises across Edmonton in an effort to better tell the story of crisis diversion and return actionable information to the community.

tech business

TELUS to beta-test Indigenous-powered AI tool

TELUS will become the first beta tester of wâsikan kisewâtisiwin, a writing tool that uses artificial intelligence to help non-Indigenous people accurately communicate about Indigenous Peoples by correcting unconscious bias or racism in written material.

regional city council

'Edge cities' should maintain unique identity, says urban scholar

While much effort has been put into creating a cohesive identity for the Edmonton metropolitan region, something important will be lost if the municipalities around the big city lose themselves, says Murtaza Haider, executive director of the Cities Institute at the University of Alberta.

technology business

Edmonton50 list recognizes region's most scalable startups

Ultracoustics Technologies, a University of Alberta-born company that has developed an "optical microphone" that uses light to detect sounds, ranked first on Scale Up Canada's Edmonton50 list of the region's most scalable companies.

A pigeon on top of a glass roof with blue sky in the background
events

Happenings: May 11, 2026

Here are some events happening today in the Edmonton area.

Elsa Robinson's The Garden, with a tree as its centrepiece
arts awards

Arts awards celebrate Edmonton's creative best

An artist who created a monumental garden rooted in memories; a filmmaker who told the story of a barrier-breaking hockey player; a writer who took a playful look at stock photography; and a musician whose record explores ambition, love, nostalgia, and growth — those are the winners of this year's Edmonton Arts Prizes.