by Peggy High '55
Are you sleep-deprived and weary? Stressed? Looking for new ways to work out or nutritious meal ideas? There’s one magazine on the shelves — Fitness— that can both tackle these problems and claim a Chapin alumna as its editor in chief.
Betty Wong Ortiz ’90 assumed the top editorial spot at Fitness in 2008, equipped with an impressive résumé in the consumer magazine industry. She is a graduate of Cornell University, where she majored in communication, and attended the Radcliffe Publishing Course, but she credits Chapin with her decision to become an editor.
“Chapin taught me the importance of communicating effectively, whether through the written word, art, photography, dance or drama,” Betty said. The primary catalyst for her publishing career was her senior-year experience as yearbook editor: “I still remember how proud I felt to hold that finished product in my hands, recalling all the work that went behind those images and words.”
Since then, many publications beyond the Chapin yearbook have benefited from her expertise. After stints at McCall’s and Redbook, she began a rapid ascent through the editorial ranks of magazines including American Baby, Parents, Working Mother, Ladies’ Home Journal and Family Circle.
Betty’s work at many of these publications has focused on wellness, from pregnancy and child development to nutrition and exercise. She says she “sort of fell into health and fitness,” but clearly she has landed on her feet. She encapsulates her work in this way: “My job is mainly to fix, reshape and polish other people’s writing as well as to come up with creative and fresh story ideas and concepts.”
Her own life and family often help her generate such ideas; in turn, her magazine work has reciprocal effects. Betty’s “family circle” includes her husband, Camilo, a professor of clinical psychology, and their children, Juliet, 8, and Gabriel, 3 — a perfect audience on which to practice Fitness’s wellness advice and to try out its recipes.
Fortunately, Betty’s children are both “good, healthy eaters,” which she attributes to living in a diverse household. “Whenever we get together with family, it’s Chinese cooking. My husband’s family is Colombian. And when I cook, I do a mix of everything. Juliet and Gabriel’s favorite is my black bean vegetarian chili.”
Health and wellness news, then, is something that Betty has been able to spread to both her smallest audiences and her largest. She has represented various magazines she has worked for on radio and television, doing parenting and health segments on broadcasts such as The Today Show and CBS Early Show, and has spoken at conferences on diversity and balancing work and life. Yet it is her editorial tasks that she loves the most.
In the quiet of the night, having met the demands of family life, Betty’s light will still be burning. As she pores over manuscripts and layouts, she will be reveling once again in “images and words,” the work she learned to love so long ago at Chapin.