The former managing editor of San Francisco-based GigaOM, Carolyn Pritchard, is joining the UBC School of Journalism as an instructor for the 2011-12 academic year.

Pritchard has worked as an editor and reporter in online media for more than 12 years. Before joining the technology-focused GigaOM network, she spent nearly six years at MarketWatch, where she helped to launch and eventually run its West Coast breaking news desk.

Her 2007 feature story “Climate: The Food Chain’s Weakest Link” was part of an investor’s guide to global warming that received the Best in Business Award from The Society of American Business Editors and Writers. Her work has also appeared in numerous Canadian media outlets, including the Business News Network and The Financial Post.

Pritchard joins the journalism school from Stanford University’s Graduate School of Business, where she worked as a writing coach in 2010, as part of its Mastery in Communication Initiative. She will be teaching students in the Integrated Journalism, New Media and Society, and International Reporting courses at UBC.

She holds a Master’s in Journalism from UC Berkeley, which she attended as a Bloomberg Business Scholar. Born and raised in Vancouver, she graduated from UBC in 1994, with a BA in Women’s Studies.