Carrying MPR with them wherever they go—Jen and Sean Kelly

Sep 28, 2026

MPR donors Jen and Sean Kelly with their children at the Minnesota State Fair

Jen Kelly identifies the long drive to and from figure skating lessons as the source of her love for public radio. “My mother drove me, and we listened to MPR and All Things Considered on the way to lessons and The World on the way home. I loved skating, and I loved those drives. I remember that time as quiet and calming.” One of an elite group of skaters. “I was not nationally competitive, but I took it really seriously”

“Growing up in Orono, MN, my parents wanted us to be aware of more than the four walls. I always felt like we had a pretty broad exposure to the world.”

Jen vividly remembers when The Current launched. “I was in high school, and I thought it was the coolest thing since sliced bread. I was in the indie music club, and hours and hours of my childhood were spent listening to those voices and sounds”

Jen left Minnesota for Hamilton College and rarely came back. But as soon as the app for The Current came out, she could listen from New York. “It was rocky. When it worked, it was great. Eventually I switched to WNYC, mostly because I needed to know the weather report. I built an affinity for WNYC, too. The personalities started to feel like family.”

Jen’s mom, Linda Hall, had a storied business career that included serving as an executive at Honeywell and Ceridian. Hall became CEO of MinuteClinic, a start-up. “I remember going to her office and being positively exposed to her work. She was really involved in the community, and I learned about giving back. It was clear early on that that's part of the portfolio of things that you do. You work hard, you spend time with family, and you plug into the community in ways that feel like your thing. Find the things that matter to you and then do them.”

Jen met Sean Kelly when she was in law school. Sean had just moved to New York City after graduating college. “We lived, like, 6 blocks apart, and we were introduced by my best friend from college, who was a good friend of his from high school.”

Sean works at Pfizer in business development, bringing drugs to market. He's also an MBA candidate at the University of Minnesota and an avid 99.5 YourClassical listener.

Jen, who has worked with younger companies, has just moved their family to Connecticut and started a job with eBay. While it is an older, established brand, she reports the company is transforming and growing. The work is challenging. Jen is looking forward to more global travel, with shows like The World and BBC as companions and guides. Jen speaks Mandarin (it was her major in college), which will be valuable for her work. One of her first international trips will be to Shanghai.

Jen joined the MPR board in the past few years and is excited about serving. “Serving on the board, I am being shaped as a young executive. I’ve been unseated as the youngest board member recently, I'm pretty sure, but I, like, like being the voice of the millennial generation in the room.”

She’s excited about the strategic future of MPR | APMG. “So much of media is at arm’s length. MPR is deeply embedded in the community, and it’s their superpower. It’s a reinforcing flywheel of engagement and involvement that gives MPR its strength.” At a recent board meeting, Jen heard CEO Jean Taylor outline their longer-term strategy and the positioning of the organization as a civic institution and how it will evolve. “They are meeting this moment of intensity, churn, and uncertainty. They are grabbing it by the horns. ‘They’ say burn it down. We build it back, and here's how we're gonna meet the moment. That is amazing leadership, and I feel really excited by her vision.”

Jen and Sean have made a significant commitment to MPR’s comprehensive campaign. “I always wanted to be involved. At first, I was a $5 a month sustaining member, and it was my mom's money. I wanted to feel like I was not just consuming, but I was contributing. Now I am making my own big girl money; I can do that in a bigger way. And when I think about the ways that I spend my time, I have so little time. I’ve picked one thing that I want to do in the giving-back space in this season of my life, and it's MPR and APMG.”

“The access to information that we have in this period of human history is both incredible and also really damaging. I don't think our brains are designed to process it and accommodate it. MPR | APMG balances storytelling that's delivered to you so that we can digest, say, the 10-minute Marketplace snippet and use it and carry it forward into our day.”