Staff Bio

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Iris Adler

Iris Adler is a former reporter, News Director, and Executive Director for Programming and Podcasts at WBUR Radio. In these roles she reported widely on Boston and New England and helped oversee the station’s news coverage, special projects and national and local programming. Most recently, she created WBUR’s Innovation Lab where she oversaw new initiatives, including […]

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Sami Mahdi

Sami Mahdi is the Bureau Chief of Radio Azadi (Radio Free Europe/ Radio Liberty) in Afghanistan. He was previously Director of PAYK Investigative Journalism Center and Strategic Advisor to Tolonews. He worked as C.E.O. of Khurshid TV from 2013-2014 and as Director of News and Current Affairs at 1TV from 2009-2013. He has also been an op-ed

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Jennifer Preston

Jennifer Preston was most recently Vice President for Journalism at the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation. For more than six years she oversaw an ambitious expansion of Knight’s portfolio to help address the gaps in local original reporting and equitable community information, halt the spread of mis/disinformation, and fund legal resources for journalists to hold the powerful

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Ann Cooper

Ann Cooper has more than 25 years of radio and print reporting experience. She also worked as executive director of the Committee to Protect Journalists prior to joining the Columbia Journalism School faculty, where she retired in 2019 as CBS Professor Emerita of Professional Practice.

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April Glaser

April Glaser is an investigative journalist at NBC News, covering the technology industry and labor and workplace culture in Silicon Valley. Previously, she worked at Slate, Recode, and Wired, reporting on AI, disinformation and hate online, and social media platforms. Before journalism, Glaser worked at the Electronic Frontier Foundation and various other nonprofits focusing on

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Don Baer

Don Baer has had a career that spans roles as a media and communications executive for a range of business, government, political and non-profit enterprises. Since 2014 he has been the Chair of PBS’s Board of Directors. He is also the lead independent director and member of the Board of Directors of the Meredith Corporation, a

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Gwyneth Williams

Gwyneth Williams recently left the BBC, having been Controller of Radio 4 and 4 Extra since 2011. Before that she was Director of the World Service in English, Editor of the BBC Reith Lectures for many years, and Head of BBC Radio Current Affairs. She started her career at the BBC writing current affairs talks for the World

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Tara Westover

Tara Westover, author of Educated. Tara Westover received her BA from Brigham Young University in 2008 and was subsequently awarded a Gates Cambridge Scholarship. She earned an MPhil from Trinity College, Cambridge in 2009, and in 2010 was a visiting fellow at Harvard University. She then returned to the University of Cambridge, where she was awarded a

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Adam Moss

Adam Moss was the editor-in-chief of New York Magazine from 2004–2019. During his 15-year tenure he oversaw an ambitious digital expansion of parent company New York Media, which included five digital publications in addition to New York: Vulture, The Cut, Intelligencer, The Strategist, and Grub Street, each of which were created from scratch and collectively reach an

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Jane Perlez

Jane Perlez, bureau chief for The New York Times in Beijing. She has been a long time foreign correspondent for The Times, serving in East Africa, Central Europe, Southeast Asia, and Pakistan. She was a member of the team that won the Pulitzer Prize in 2008 for coverage of Pakistan and Afghanistan. She is married to Raymond Bonner, former foreign correspondent for The

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Kathy Pham

Kathy Pham, computer scientist, product leader, and researcher on ethics and technology. She has held roles in product management, software engineering, data science, and leadership in the private, non-profit, and public sectors. Her work has spanned Google, IBM, Harris Healthcare, and the federal government at the United States Digital Service at the White House, where

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Koa Beck

Koa Beck is the former editor-in-chief of Jezebel and the co-host of “The #MeToo Memos” on WNYC’s The Takeaway. She was previously the executive editor of Vogue.com and senior features editor at MarieClaire.com. Her literary criticism and reporting on gender, LGBTQ rights, culture, and race have appeared in a wide variety of print and online outlets.

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Miguel Head

Miguel Head spent the past decade as a senior advisor to the British Royal Family. He joined the Royal Household as Press Secretary to Prince William and Prince Harry before being appointed in 2012 as their youngest ever Chief of Staff. Previously, Head was Chief Press Officer at the UK Ministry of Defense, and worked for the Liberal

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Juan Carlos Iragorri

Juan Carlos Iragorri is an award-winning Colombian journalist and author who directs Voces RCN, one of the most influential political radio shows in Colombia, and founded Club de Prensa, a Spanish-language television news program broadcasted live in Washington D.C. with foreign journalists and political pundits. He is an international correspondent for Semana magazine, reporting from Washington D.C. and Madrid, and

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Edward F. O’Keefe

Edward F. O’Keefe served most recently as Senior Vice President, Content Development at CNN, and is a media industry expert in mobile, short-form video, OTT and streaming content. O’Keefe’s initiatives at CNN included expanding the network’s podcasts and short-form non-fiction production (which won CNN a Primetime Emmy for Anthony Bourdain: Explore Parts Unknown), and launching CNNVR. He was previously Vice President

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Adam Serwer

Adam Serwer is a Staff Writer at The Atlantic, covering politics. He has previously worked for BuzzFeed News, MSNBC, Mother Jones and The American Prospect. While at the Shorenstein Center, Serwer planned to conduct research into the historical role that black voters have played in defending and advancing the foundational American notion that all people are created

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Markus Paul Somm

Markus Paul Somm was, until late 2018, Publisher and Editor-in-Chief of the Basler Zeitung, the largest daily newspaper in the Basle area of Switzerland. Educated as a historian and political scientist, Somm has published several books on Swiss history and politics. He lives with his family in the Zurich area. While at the Shorenstein Center, Somm

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Nancy Farese

Nancy Farese is a social entrepreneur, philanthropist and photographer working at the nexus of visual media and social change. She is the founder of PhotoPhilanthropy (2009) and CatchLight (2015), whose mission it is to foster a more robust visual ecosystem to promote civic engagement and mutual understanding. She is an award-winning visual journalist and photographer,

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James Harkin

James Harkin is the director of the Centre for Investigative Journalism in London. An Irish journalist covering new media, politics, and conflict, Harkin has reported from Syria and Iraq for Vanity Fair, Harper’s Magazine, GQ, The Guardian and Newsweek. His latest book, Hunting Season, investigates the rise of the Islamic State in Syria and its kidnapping of journalists. While at the Shorenstein Center, Harkin

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Roderick P. Hart

Roderick P. Hart holds the Shivers Chair in Communication and is Professor of Government at the University of Texas at Austin. Former dean of the Moody College of Communication and founding director of the Annette Strauss Institute for Civic Life, Hart is the author or editor of fifteen books, the most recent of which is Civic Hope:

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