Serena Altschul

(CBS News)  Serena Altschul was named as a CBS News contributing correspondent in December 2003. She works as a contributor for "CBS News Sunday Morning."

Altschul was previously a New York-based correspondent for CNN (2002-03). She produced and hosted a one-hour "CNN Presents" special on the return of PCP that aired last November and also contributed to "NewsNight With Aaron Brown."

While at CNN, Altschul continued to serve as a reporter and producer for MTV News, which she joined in 1996 as a contributor to the cable network's "Choose or Lose" political awareness campaign. She covered a wide variety of hard news and popular culture stories for MTV, including profiles of political leaders and musical legends. Altschul also created, produced and hosted an MTV documentary series called "Breaking it Down," hour-long, single-topic specials that focused on issues such as gang violence, homeless teenagers and the effects of the drug trade. That series ran for four years (1999-2002). She hosted two acclaimed editions of MTV's "True Life" series, one on heroin abuse among affluent Dallas teenagers and another on the murder of Matthew Shepard, an openly gay student at the University of Wyoming.

In December 2001, she contributed to an edition of the CBS News magazine "48 Hours" on the increasing use and abuse of Oxycontin.

Before that, Altschul was a reporter for Channel One News, the news channel seen in high schools nationwide. She also produced "The Last Party," a documentary on the 1992 presidential election, while in college.

Altschul was born in New York City. She attended Scripps College in Claremont, Calif. She lives in New York.