Petra Mayer

Izolda Trakhtenberg

Petra Mayer is an associate producer and director for the weekend editions of All Things Considered. She handles the program's recurring ethicist segment, which features New York Times Magazine ethics columnist Randy Cohen. She's also the person to ask if you want to know how much snow is outside NPR's Washington headquarters on a Saturday, how to belly dance, or what pro wrestling looks like up close and personal.

Mayer originally came to NPR as an engineering assistant in 1994, while still attending Amherst College. After three years spending summers honing her soldering skills in the maintenance shop, she made the jump to Boston's WBUR as a newswriter in 1997. Mayer returned to NPR in 2000 after a roundabout journey that included a master's degree in journalism from Columbia University and a two-year stint as a producer at the Prague headquarters of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty. While at Columbia, she made a three-part documentary on pirate radio in America.

Mayer grew up in Washington, D.C. and now lives just over the District line in Takoma Park, Maryland.