Florida News Center

(from OrlandoSentinel.com) - Former WESH-Channel 2 anchor Wendy Chioji is coming back to Orlando television in a big way later this month. She will start co-anchoring a series of specials on WKMG-Channel 6 that pay tribute to survivors of health crises and personal battles.

The specials will be called “Surviving & Thriving,” and the first will air at 9 p.m. Dec. 21. A new special will air each quarter next year.

Chioji will anchor with WKMG’s Lauren Rowe and Gaard Swanson.

The specials are produced by Bolder Broadcasting, which is behind the syndicated series “Growing Bolder.” Chioji works on that series with her former WESH colleagues Marc Middleton and Bill Shafer. The two men will be correspondents on the “Surviving & Thriving” specials….Cont….

(from OrlandoSentinel.com) – “Growing Bolder,” a locally produced TV series featuring alumni of WESH-Channel 2, started its second national season last weekend. Former WESH anchor Wendy Chioji has come aboard the program, which airs at 11:30 a.m. Sundays on WMFE-Channel 24.

The series started last season on 20 public television stations and grew to 275, said former WESH anchor Marc Middleton. He founded the Growing Bolder Media Group in Maitland.

The company celebrates life-affirming, age-defying attitudes via radio and a website. But the TV show has been a special success for TV veterans Middleton and Bill Shafer, who can tell longer feature stories on the program….Cont….

(picture/story from OrlandoSentinel.com) – You’ll get to see the former WESH-Channel 2 anchor again when she joins “Growing Bolder” in its second season, which starts this spring on PBS stations.

It’s a reunion for Chioji, who is working with former WESH colleagues Marc Middleton and Bill Shafer on the show produced by the Growing Bolder Media Group in Maitland.

The show urges viewers 40 and older to, well, grow bolder. Middleton said Chioji embodies that theme: “She’s grown bolder. She has from the day she left WESH.”

In May, it will be three years since Chioji departed WESH after 20 years at the NBC affiliate….Cont….