Michael Cooke is the outgoing Editor of the Toronto Star, a position he has held for the past nine years. Raised near Lancaster in Northern England, Michael worked on London’s Fleet Street, and at Bristol’s Western Daily Press before emigrating to Canada. There he joined The Star, Canada's largest newspaper, before moving to The Gazette in Montreal and The Edmonton Journal. He became editor in chief of The Vancouver Province in 1995.

Michael was one of a team of founding editors of Canada’s new national newspaper, The National Post.  And, for the summer of 1998, Michael served as the last editor of The Financial Post, supervising the paper’s merger with the new national newspaper.  During both periods, Michael continued to edit The Province.  He was named editor in chief of the Chicago Sun-Times in 2000.

He was appointed editor in chief of the New York Daily News in 2005, returning to Chicago as Vice-President of Editorial for the Chicago Sun-Times news Group (100 titles) in 2006 and re-appointed editor in chief of the Sun-Times that same year.

Michael has travelled extensively in Africa in the last five years, most notable doing pro-bono work for the Canadian-based Journalists For Human Rights foundation. He has given journalism seminars in many countries, with longer stays in Congo, Ghana, Sierra Leone and Liberia and has recently become a videographer.