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Cnn.com's Nicole Lapin

Although her easygoing conversational style may tempt you to believe otherwise, Nicole Lapin is one accomplished 24-year-old.
Prior to securing an anchor position on CNN.com Live (and earning the title of youngest anchor in the network’s history), the experiences that brought her to this point sound almost unbelievable, as she casually confirms each of them like items on a grocery list. When she verifies the educational portion of her resume, Lapin takes on a friendly, if not humble tone that puts you at ease. Yes, she entered Harvard at 15, later transferred to Columbia, UCLA, and finally Northwestern’s Medill School of Journalism, where she graduated as 2005 valedictorian—and yes, she somehow squeezed in studying European politics in Paris and Brussels along the way—but she has a simple explanation for it all.
“I just love being curious,” she quips in her trademark blend of broadcaster-meets-best-friend. Like the parents of many prodigies, her immigrant mother (a former Miss Israel) and father (a Nobel Prize nominee who pioneered bloodless surgery and passed away when Nicole was 11) instilled in their children a hunger for knowledge. “All that mattered was studying and being smart,” Lapin says. But with one key stipulation: no news allowed. And they meant it. “They had us studying algebra and chemistry at this ridiculously early age, but I would always flip on the news, and made sure I had Disney Channel on the recall button so I could flip it back over. It was like I was watching some R-rated movie.” By sneaking in Gulf War coverage on the sly, she was unwittingly mirroring her future. “Think about this irony,” she laughs. “Now, my mom has to watch me on the news to see me every day.”


Lapin’s family resided in Orange County, but “we ate at Red Robin, and we shopped at Target. It wasn’t ‘the OC.’ It was just Orange County, and we were the only Jewish family on the block.” School was the one non-traditional factor in her childhood; when she says that her magnet elementary school “was very hippie and didn’t believe in grades,” she is not only referring to report cards. “I was never in first grade or second grade. I was a Butterfly; then I was a Rabbit.” Later, at the Los Angeles County High School for the Arts, she was the first dance major to become valedictorian. Always consumed with intellectual curiosity, Lapin never bothered to limit her goals; and you already know the rest of the story.
So, what does a day in the life of the grown-up Nicole Lapin entail? Because CNN anchors ad-lib a healthy portion of the copy they deliver, a grasp of the day’s news is essential; by seven a.m., she is already hitting the stepper machine while devouring the top stories from an assortment of morning shows and New York Times articles. An hour or so later, it’s off to the studio, where the first order of business is to “get some schlak put on my face.”
After hours of taping of Internet reports, live updates, and a series of her own creation, Young People Who Rock, Lapin doesn’t have much free time after her late-night meetings are dismissed. What few nights and weekends remain are normally dedicated to her ambassador role in the Starlight Starbright Children’s Foundation; she is passionate about carrying on the legacy of her dad through charity. One memory that drives her is the family’s annual Christmas gift delivery to the children’s ward of the hospital he operated. “On one of the ICU floors, there were these footprint tracks; I remember him telling the kids, ‘It’s from the reindeer!’ Those are the things I want to emulate with my life.”
Although Lapin hopes to never again declare the facts of a story like the Virginia Tech massacre to the public, she is proud to have been a trustworthy source for students in the midst of the chaos. With no access to television in their dorms, they tuned in to CNN.com for their evacuation updates. When hosting Young People Who Rock, Lapin says, “I always tell my guests, ‘We have to show young people like that gunman; now, give me a better story to tell.’ And I’m so proud of all of them.” While she may hesitate to agree, we think her story deserves a segment as well.