Forum on Government and Public Policy
Forums are free and open to the public for in-person participation. Seating for all of the below events are first come first serve.
Nate Hochman
National Review Writer
What is the Future of Conservatism?
Thursday, September 8th, 2022, at 7:00 pm
Location: Auditorium (14 Granada Street, St. Augustine, FL 32084)
Nate Hochman is a staff writer at National Review and a 2021-22 Robert Novak Fellow at the Fund for American Studies. His writing has appeared in print and online in The American Conservative, City Journal, The Claremont Review of Books, National Affairs, National Review, The New York Times, and numerous other outlets, and he’s a regular guest on television, podcasts and radio. He was described as “a rising star in the intellectual right” by NPR, and “a key figure on the US intellectual right” by The New Statesman; he’s also been described with adjectives that can’t be included in this bio by a long list of angry Twitter users. A 2021 Publius Fellow at the Claremont Institute, he graduated with distinction in Political Science from Colorado College in May 2021.
Günther Jikeli
The Erna B. Rosenfeld Professor in Jewish Studies at Indiana University
The Return of Radical Antisemitism: Online, Offline, Where, Why, and What to do about it.
Date: Thursday, August 25th, from 4:00 pm – 5:00 pm
Location: Flagler Room (Ponce De Leon Hall, 74 King Street, St Augustine, Fl 32084)
Günther Jikeli holds the Erna B. Rosenfeld Professorship at Indiana University's Institute for the Study of Contemporary Antisemitism at the Borns Jewish Studies Program. He is an associate professor in Germanic Studies and Jewish Studies at Indiana University. His latest book "The Return of Religious Antisemitism?" (ed.) was published in 2021. In 2019, he published (with Olaf Glockner) "Das neue Unbehagen. Antisemitismus in Deutschland heute" [The New Unease. Antisemitism in Germany Today]. In 2015, he published the monograph "European Muslim Antisemitism." with IU Press. In 2013, he was awarded the Raoul Wallenberg Prize in Human Rights and Holocaust Studies. Günther's academic work was recognized in 2019 by The Algemeiner as one of "The Top 100 People Positively Influencing Jewish Life." Jikeli is the editor of a book (2014) on forced labor at Peenemunde from 1936 to 1945 for the construction of the V-2 Rocket under technical director Wernher von Braun. The book underlines the irrationality of this endeavor, which led to immense suffering. His research focuses on online and offline forms of contemporary antisemitism. He runs the research lab "Social Media & Hate." Dr. Jikeli offers supervision and advice for students who wish to study antisemitism or who are writing a thesis related to antisemitism/ critical antisemitism studies.
Alexander Heffner
Host of PBS Show “The Open Mind”
Civil Discourse an Uncivil Age
Thursday, October 13th, 2022, at 7:00 pm
Location: Virginia Room, 2nd Floor of the Student Center (50 Sevilla Street, St. Augustin, FL 32084)
Alexander is host of The Open Mind on PBS. He has covered American culture, politics, and civic life since the 2008 presidential campaign. He is coauthor of best-selling A Documentary History of the United States (Penguin, 2022), and recipient of University of Denver’s Anvil of Freedom Award, Franklin Pierce University’s Fitzwater Medallion for Leadership in Public Communication, and Yale University’s Poynter Fellowship in Journalism. He is profiled in The Wrap, Mediaite, The Washington Post, The New York Times, The Des Moines Register, Christian Science Monitor, Variety, Medium, and on MSNBC, C-SPAN, NPR, CNN, ABC and the BBC. His writing appears in USA TODAY, WIRED, TIME, The Wall Street Journal, The Independent, NYT's Room for Debate, Boston Globe, and Philadelphia Inquirer, among other publications. He has lectured at the Newseum, National Constitution Center, Museum of American Finance, FDR Library and Museum, The American University in Cairo, Initiative for Truth at University of Sydney, Center for Information and Bubble Studies at University of Copenhagen, Institute on Constitutional Democracy at University of Missouri, Civil Discourse Lab at the University of New Hampshire, Department of Writing and Rhetoric at University of Mississippi, Center for Constitutional Democracy at Marshall University, Catt Center for Women and Politics at Iowa State, Clarke Forum at Dickinson College, and Alpha Seminar at Carroll College, among other institutions of learning.
Learn More: www.alexanderheffner.com
Dr. Raymond P. Scheindlin
Professor of Medieval Hebrew Literature Emeritus, Jewish Theological Seminary of America
Wine, Women, and Death: The Worldly Pleasures of the Courtier-Rabbis of Islamic Spain
THIS EVENT HAS BEEN CANCELED
Wednesday, November 9th, 2022,at 7:00 pm
Location: Virginia Room, 2nd Floor of the Student Center (50 Sevilla Street, St. Augustin, FL 32084)
Wine, Women, and Death: The Worldly Pleasures of the Courtier-Rabbis of Islamic Spain
Raymond P. Scheindlin is a translator of Hebrew poetry and an academic specialist in premodern Hebrew literature. His books centering on verse translations include Wine, Women, and Death: Medieval Hebrew Poems on the Good Life (Oxford University Press, 1986); The Gazelle: Medieval Hebrew Poems on God, Israel, and the Soul (Oxford University Press, 1991); and The Book of Job (Norton, 1998). His study of the twelfth-century pilgrim Judah Halevi, entitled The Song of the Distant Dove: Judah Halevi’s Pilgrimage (OUP, 2007), includes many of Halevi’s greatest poems in translation and a detailed narrative of Halevi’s journey. His most recent book, on a poet with whom he strongly identifies, is Vulture in a Cage: Poems by Solomon Ibn Gabirol (to be published by Archipelago Books in 2016). Trained in Arabic literature at Columbia University (Ph.D., 1971) and in Hebrew literature at the Jewish Theological Seminary (M.H.L., 1963; Rabbi, 1965), Scheindlin is professor of medieval Hebrew literature at the Seminary, having previously taught at McGill and Cornell Universities. He has published numerous academic articles on Hebrew literature in its medieval Golden Age, largely dealing with the interplay between the Hebrew and Arabic literary traditions. He is also author of A Short History of the Jewish People (OUP, 1998) and 501 Arabic Verbs (Barron’s Educational Series, 2007). He has been a visiting professor at the Hochschule für jüdische Studien in Heidelberg and at Harvard University. A former Guggenheim and Cullman Fellow, as well as a recipient of the Cultural Achievement Award of the National Foundation for Jewish Culture, he lives in New York City and Bethel, New York, with his wife (opera singer Janice Meyerson), two cats, two pianos, and a fiberglass cow.
Learn More: www.raymondscheindlin.com
Hedrick Smith
Putin, the U.S. and the New World Order
Thursday, February 2nd, 2023, at 7:00 pm
Location: Auditorium (14 Granada Street, St. Augustine, FL 32084)
Hedrick Smith, Pulitzer Prize-winning former New York Times reporter and editor and Emmy award-winning producer/correspondent, has established himself over the past 50 years of his career as one of America’s most distinguished journalists.
In 26 years with The New York Times, Mr. Smith covered Martin Luther King Jr and the civil rights struggle, the Vietnam War in Saigon, the Middle East conflict from Cairo, the Cold War from both Moscow and Washington, and six American presidents and their administrations. In 1971, as chief diplomatic correspondent, he was a member of the Pulitzer Prize-winning team that produced the Pentagon Papers series. In 1974, he won the Pulitzer Prize for International Reporting from Russia and Eastern Europe.
His book The Russians, based on his years as New York Times Moscow Bureau Chief from 1971-74, was a No. 1 American best-seller. It has been translated into 16 languages and has been widely used in university and college courses. His next book, The Power Game: How Washington Works, was also a major best-seller. It became a bible for newly elected members of Congress and their staffs and was a bedside reading for President Clinton. His newest book, Who Stole the American Dream? published by Random House in September 2012 , has been hailed by critics for brilliant analysis of political and economic trends and changes in the U.S. over the past 30-40 years.
Learn More: http://hedricksmith.com/about-hedrick-smith/
Michael Moss
Investigative Journalist and Pulitzer Prize Winner
Hooked: The Extraordinary Science Behind Our Junk Food Addiction
Thursday, March 2nd, 2023, at 7:00 pm
Location: Auditorium (14 Granada Street, St. Augustine, FL 32084)
Michael Moss is the author of the New York Times #1 bestseller, "Salt Sugar Fat," an exposé of the processed food industry, and the bestseller, "Hooked: Food, Free Will and How the Food Giants Exploit Our Addictions," both published by Random House. As an investigative reporter with The New York Times, he won the Pulitzer Prize for Explanatory Reporting in 2010 for his work on contaminated meat. He was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in 2006 for his reporting on the lack of protective armor for soldiers in Iraq, and in 1999 for a group effort on Wall Street's emerging influence in the nursing home industry. He lives in Brooklyn with his wife, Eve Heyn, and two guinea pig sisters that their youngest son Will couldn't take to college.
Learn More: www.pulitzer.org/winners/michael-moss-and-members-staff
Howard Schneider
Stony Brook Professor and Founder of the School’s News Literacy Program
Fake News: We Have Found the Solution and It is Us!
Tuesday, April 25th, 2023, at 7:00 pm
Location: Auditorium (14 Granada Street, St. Augustine, FL 32084)
Howard Schneider is the Executive Director of the School of Communication and Journalism's Center for News Literacy, which developed the nation's first undergraduate course in how to be a discerning news consumer. The Center's news literacy course has been completed by more than 17,000 students across the U.S., in 11 countries and online through Coursera. Schneider is the Founding Dean of the Journalism School and previously had spent 35 years as a working journalist for Newsday, where for 18 years he served as managing editor and then editor. Under his editorial leadership, the newspaper won eight Pulitzer Prizes and became one of the first newspapers in the nation to create news websites.
Learn More: https://www.stonybrook.edu/experts/profile/howard-schneider
Previous Forum Speakers
Father Columba Stewart
Tuesday, February 1st, 2022, at 7 P.M.
Cultural Heritage Present and Future: A Benedictine Monk’s Long View
Columba Stewart is Professor of Theology at the Saint John's School of Theology and executive director of the Hill Museum & Manuscript Library (HMML), both in Collegeville, MN. Because of his work at HMML leading the digitization, cataloging, and online access for more than 300,000 endangered Christian and Islamic manuscripts in libraries around the world, he has been featured in international radio programs, newspapers and documentaries, and the CBS News television program “60 Minutes.” At HMML he has led several projects funded by the National Endowment for the Humanities, the Arcadia Fund, the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, and the Henry Luce Foundation. Most recently he has been a member in the School of Historical Studies at the Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton, NY (2016-2020), a Guggenheim Fellow (2016), and a Resident Scholar at the Collegeville Institute (2018-). A Benedictine monk of Saint John's Abbey since 1981, he publishes regularly in his field of eastern and western Christian monastic history. He is currently writing a new study of the origins of Christian asceticism and monasticism. He was the 2019 Jefferson Lecturer in the Humanities for the NEH and a 2019-2020 Phi Beta Kappa Visiting Scholar.
Learn more about Fr. Columba Stewart here.
Lee Rainie
February 17, 2022
Tech, Tribes and Trust: the Megatrends shaping American Life
Lee Rainie is the director of internet and technology research at Pew Research Center. Under his leadership, the Center has issued more than 650 reports based on its surveys that examine people’s online activities and the internet’s role in their lives. The American Sociological Association gave Rainie its award for “excellence in the reporting on social issues” in 2014 and described his work as the “most authoritative source of reliable data on the use and impact of the internet and mobile connectivity.” Rainie is a co-author of Networked: The new social operating system and five books about the future of the internet that are drawn from the Center’s research. He gives several dozen speeches a year to government officials, media leaders, scholars and students, technology executives, librarians, and nonprofit groups about the changing media ecosystem. Prior to launching Pew Research Center’s technology research, Rainie was managing editor of U.S. News & World Report.
David Abel
March 8, 2022
Flagler Topic: “Entangled – the Race to Save the North Atlantic Right Whale.”
A photojournalist, award-winning reporter on the Boston Globe staff since 1999, David Abel has covered war in the Balkans, unrest in Latin America, national security issues in Washington D.C., terrorism in New York and Boston, and climate change and poverty in New England. Abel, also a documentary filmmaker and an occasional professor of journalism, was part of the team that won the 2014 Pulitzer Prize for Breaking News for the paper’s coverage of the Boston Marathon bombings. Abel was standing on the finish line when the Boston Marathon bombs detonated a few steps away and played a key role in the Globe's coverage of the attack and its aftermath. His footage from the finish line was part of a package that was nominated for an Emmy and won a national Edward R. Murrow Award. He now covers the environment for the Globe.
Andrea Barnet
March 22, 2022
Author, “Visionary Women.” Flagler Topic: The pioneering lives of Jane Goodall and Alice Waters.
Andrea Barnet was a regular contributor to the New York Times Book Review for twenty-five years, where she wrote primarily on the arts and culture, with a special concentration on biographies of early twentieth-century artistic and literary figures. She is the author of All-Night Party: The Women of Bohemian Greenwich Village and Harlem, 1913-1930, which was a finalist for the 2004 Lambda Literary Awards and Visionary Women, How Rachel Carson, Jane Jacobs, Jane Goodall and Alice Waters Changed our World, a finalist for the 2019 PEN/ Bograd Weld Award for biography. Her journalism has appeared in Smithsonian Magazine, the New York Times, Harper’s Bazaar, Elle and The Toronto Globe and Mail, among other publications. In 1999 her profile of the Boys Choir of Harlem for Smithsonian was nominated for the Community Action Network Service Award. In 2010 she was a director’s guest in writing at Civitella Ranieri in Italy. She splits her time between the Hudson Valley and New York City, where she lives with her husband, the painter Kit White.
Back To Top2021 Season
Tuesday, January 19, 2021, at 4:00 PM
William "Bill" Douglas
NHL.com Staff Writer and author of "The Color of Hockey"
Topic: "Athletes, Politics and Sport"
Bio: Douglas visited Flagler once before in 2008 to discuss more general politics. At the time, Douglas was the White House correspondent for McClatchy Newspapers. He was part of McClatchyʼs 2008 presidential campaign team, having started the season covering former New York Mayor Rudy Giulianiʼs campaign, before shifting to Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, and finally to Republican presidential candidate John McCain. Douglas previously spent 16 years at New Yorkʼs Newsday and covered education, higher education, the New York State Legislature, Congress, President Bill Clintonʼs second term, and foreign affairs. Douglas has also reported from city desks of The Charlotte Observer and the Baltimore Evening Sun, and on the features desk of The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Douglas was born in Long Beach, Calif., raised in Philadelphia, and is a 1980 graduate of the University of South Carolinaʼs College of Journalism and Mass Communications.
Thursday, January 28, 2021, at 4:00 PM
Jim Toedtman
Director of the Flagler College Forum on Government & Public Policy
Topic: Curiosity Won't Kill the Cat; How to Break Out of Our Silos
Bio: Toedtman has been covering politics and public policy for more than 35 years. He has lead Flagler’s Forum program since 2012. Previously, he was the AARP bulletin editor for seven years, during which time he interviewed President Barack Obama. Before taking the editorship of AARP Bulletin, he was a reporter and editor for the Boston Herald, the Baltimore News American and Newsday. He has covered local government, Congress and the White House and has reported from three continents. His editorials for the News American won first place in the Maryland-Delaware-D.C. Press Association in 1982, 1984 and 1985. He was member of a team of reporters awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Public Service. He also won a special citation from the Inter-American Press Association for a series of reports from Central America. Originally from Ohio, Toedtman attained his bachelor’s degree from the College of Wooster and studied at the University of Queensland, Australia, as a Rotary Foundation Fellow. He also studied at Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism, which recognized him as a distinguished alum in 2017.
TUESDAY, MARCH 16, 2021, AT 4:00 PM
Emily Fishbein
Freelance writer with Pulitzer Center
Topic: Tracking Human Rights During a Crisis
Bio: Emily Fishbein is a freelance writer who has been based in Myanmar since 2015. She seeks to share diverse stories and perspectives, especially from Kachin State. Prior to writing, she worked with refugees and displaced persons in Myanmar and the United States.
Tuesday, March 23, 2021, at 4:00 PM
Andrea Barnet
Author of "Visionary Women"
Topic: Visionary Women
Bio: Andrea Barnet was a regular contributor to the New York Times Book Review for twenty-five years, where she wrote primarily on the arts and culture, with a special concentration on biographies of early twentieth-century artistic and literary figures. She is the author of All-Night Party: The Women of Bohemian Greenwich Village and Harlem, 1913-1930, which was a finalist for the 2004 Lambda Literary Awards and Visionary Women, How Rachel Carson, Jane Jacobs, Jane Goodall and Alice Waters Changed our World, a finalist for the 2019 PEN/ Bograd Weld Award for biography. Her journalism has appeared in Smithsonian Magazine, the New York Times, Harper’s Bazaar, Elle and The Toronto Globe and Mail, among other publications. In 1999 her profile of the Boys Choir of Harlem for Smithsonian was nominated for the Community Action Network Service Award. In 2010 she was a director’s guest in writing at Civitella Ranieri in Italy. She splits her time between the Hudson Valley and New York City, where she lives with her husband, the painter Kit White.
November 16, 2021
Nora Super
Flagler Topic: “Three Trends Shaping the Politics of Aging.”
Nora Super is the senior director of the Milken Institute Center for the Future of Aging and the executive director of the Milken Institute Alliance to Improve Dementia Care. Launched in 2020, the Alliance to Improve Dementia Care seeks to transform and improve the complex health and long-term care systems that people at risk for and living with dementia must navigate. Super is a respected thought leader, frequent speaker, and prolific writer on healthy longevity and the economic and social impact of global population aging. From 2014 to 2016, Super served as the executive director of the White House Conference on Aging, where she received wide recognition for her nationwide efforts to improve the lives of older Americans. She has also held leadership roles at the US Department of Health and Human Services, AARP, Kaiser Permanente, and the National Association of Area Agencies on Aging.
Back To TopFall 2019 Season
Thursday, September 19, 2019
“Fact-Checking and the Truth in the Age of Trump”
Glenn Kessler, Editor, and Chief Writer, Washington Post Fact Checker
Glenn Kessler has been editor and chief writer of The Fact Checker since 2011. In a journalism career spanning more than three decades, Kessler has covered foreign policy, economic policy, the White House, Congress, politics, airline safety, and Wall Street. He was The Washington Post’s chief State Department reporter for nine years, traveling around the world with three secretaries of state. Before that, he covered tax and budget policy for The Washington Post and also served as the newspaper’s national business editor. Kessler frequently appears on television and has lectured widely on U.S. foreign policy. He joined the Post in 1998 from Newsday, where he was part of two reporting teams that won Pulitzer Prizes in spot reporting.
Thursday, October 10, 2019
"Prescription Drugs: Can we make them affordable?"
John Rother, President, and CEO of the National Coalition on Health Care
John Rother is the President and CEO of the National Coalition on Health Care, the largest, oldest, and most broadly-based coalition of major stakeholders promoting an affordable, sustainable, and fair health system for all Americans, whether covered by private insurance or public programs. Prior to joining the Coalition in 2011, Rother served as the longtime Executive Vice President for Policy, Strategy and International Affairs at AARP.
Spring 2020 Season
Wednesday, February 12, 2020
"Five Reasons the World Is Worried"
Richard Wike, Director of Pew Research Center's Global Attitudes Research
As the Director of Global Attitudes Research at Pew Research Center, Richard Wike is a source of independent data and analyses on important global issues such as economic, political and social. Prior to joining Pew Research, he served as Senior Associate at Greenberg Quinlan Rosner Research, providing strategic advice on political campaigns to international and corporate clients.
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Wednesday, March 11, 2020
"The Future of Food"
Melanie Saltzman, Reporter and Producer for PBS NewsHour Weekend
In her role at PBS, Saltzman reports, shoots and produces on a variety of issues, including public health, the environment and international affairs. Saltzman is a Fulbright Scholar and a critically-acclaimed producer.
Lecture Details
All lectures begin at 7:00 p.m. in the Lewis Auditorium located at 14 Granada Street. Lectures are free and open to the public.
Back To TopTUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 11, 2018
"The Rohingya Crisis: Lessons and Laments"
Nahal Toosi, Foreign Affairs Correspondent
Nahal Toosi is a foreign affairs correspondent at Politico. Toosi has previously covered higher education during her time at the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. While there, she expanded her reporting to cover migrant and refugee issues from Egypt, Thailand, Germany, South Korea and Iraq – during the 2003 invasion. Toosi has also worked for The Associated Press, based out of New York, Islamabad, Kabul and London. Most recently, she has authored a project on the Rohingya Crisis for the Pulitzer Center
- Twitter: @nahaltoosi
- Website
TUESDAY, OCTOBER 2, 2018
"The Internet Turns 50. What's Next?"
Lee Rainie, Director of Internet and Technology research at the Pew Research Center
Lee Rainie is the Director of Internet and Technology research at the Pew Research Center, a non-profit, non–partisan “fact tank” that studies the social impact of the internet. His Project was described by the American Sociological Association as the “most authoritative source of reliable data on the use and impact of the internet and mobile connectivity” and the ASA awarded him and the Internet Project its award for “excellence in the reporting on social issues award” in 2014. The Project has issued more than 700 reports based on its surveys that examine people’s online activities and the role of the internet in their lives. The Pew Research Center also has launched a sustained study of the intersection of science and society that Lee oversees. All of its reports and datasets are available online for free at: http://www.pewinternet.org. Lee is a co-author of Networked: The new social operating system with sociologist Barry Wellman about the social impact of the internet and cell phones. He is also co-author of five books about the future of the internet that are based on Project surveys about the subject.
TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 13, 2018
"The Return of the Federalist: The power of states in the Obama and Trump eras"
Elaine Povich, Senior staff writer for Pew Trusts' Stateline news service
At Stateline, a daily reporting news service of analysis on trends in state policy, Elaine Povich covers consumer affairs, specifically budget and tax issues. She has previously reported on Capitol Hill for Newsday, United Press International and the Chicago Tribune. She was awarded the Evertett McKinley Dirksen Award for distinguished reporting of Congress. Previously, Povich was the executive editor on The George Washington University project, “Face the Facts USA” and was the president of the Washington Press Club Foundation. Povich holds a bachelor’s from Cornell University and a master’s Certificate in Multimedia Journalism from the University of Maryland, where she currently serves as an adjunct lecturer.
- Twitter @espovich
THURSDAY, JANUARY 24, 2019
Carrie Dann, NBC News, Political Editor
Carrie Dann is a political editor for NBC News and co-author of “First Read” daily newsletter with Chuck Todd. She has traveled with and covered political campaigns since the 2008 presidential election.
TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 5, 2019
Paul Stebbins, Founding Member, FixUS, an initiative of the Campaign to Fix the Debt
Paul Stebbins is the founding member of FixUS, an initiative of the Campaign to Fix the Debt. As founder and former CEO, he is also a Chairman Emeritus of World Fuel Services, a Fortune 100 Company.
TUESDAY, MARCH 12, 2019
Roy Gutman, Pulitzer Prize winning reporter based in the Middle East for Frontline
Roy Gutman is a Pulitzer Prize winning reporter for international affairs. He is currently based in Istanbul as a foreign editor for Frontline.
- Twitter @roy_gutman
Tuesday, January 16
Craig Gordon
"Trumping Fake News: Facts in the Age of Trump"
Washington Bureau Chief, Bloomberg News
Craig Gordon is the Washington Bureau Chief at Bloomberg News, where he oversees all U.S. government coverage, including the White House, Cabinet agencies, Congress, national security, tax policy and financial regulation. He is also co- editor of BloombergPolitics.com and "Balance of Power," a daily Bloomber newsletter of U.S. and global politics.
Gordon went to Politico from Newsday, where he completed his 17 years there as Washington Bureau Chief. After arriving in Washington in 2000, he covered the Pentagon for four years, starting on the day after the Sept. 11 terror attacks.
Twitter: @dcraiggordon
Thursday, February 1
Domenico Montanaro
"The Golden Age of Grievance"
Lead Political Editor for NPR
Before joining NPR in 2015, Montanaro served as political director and senior producer for politics and law at PBS NewsHour. There, he led domestic political and legal coverage, which included the 2014 midterm elections, the Supreme Court and the unrest in Ferguson, Mo.
Prior to PBS NewsHour, Montanaro was deputy political editor at NBC News, where he covered two presidential elections and reported and edited for the network's political blog, "First Read." He has also worked at CBS News, ABC News, The Asbury Park Press in New Jersey, and has taught high-school English.
Twitter: @DomenicoNPR
Webpage: NPR.org
Thursday, February 8
Nicholas Johnston
"Starting a Media Company in the Trump Era"
Editor at Axios, online news media company, and former managing editor at Bloomberg News
Nicholas Johnston is the founding editor of Axios, in charge of all of its coverage including politics, technology and business. Before joining the founders of Axios Jim VandeHei, Mike Allen and Roy Schwartz, Johnston was a managing editor at Bloomberg News in Washington, D.C. There, he oversaw newsletters and breaking news products for the Bloomberg Terminal, Bloomberg Politics and Bloomberg Government. In 2011, Johnston launched Bloomberg's First Word news service in Washington after having been a White House correspondent the first two years of the Obama administration. Previously, he covered the 2008 campaign and spent four years on Capitol Hill covering Congress. Johnston joined Bloomberg from the Washington Post where he wrote about banking and technology investing. His first job in journalism was in the Post's mailroom after graduating from Georgetown University.
Twitter: @AxiosNick
Webpage: Axios.com
Thursday, March 15
Mark Murray
Senior Political Editor, NBC News
Twitter: @mmurraypolitics
Back To TopTuesday, January 31
Chuck Raasch
Chuck Raasch is a Washington columnist for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch and the author of “Imperfect Union: A Father's Search for His Son in the Aftermath of the Battle of Gettysburg.” He has also worked as a senior correspondent and columnist for the Gannett News Service (GNS) and as a national correspondent for USA Today. From 1989 to 1990, he served as a Knight Fellow at Stanford University. A native South Dakotan, Raasch began his career with Gannett at the Argus Leader in Sioux Falls in 1977, where he covered politics. His major assignments included Sen. George McGovern's last Senate race in 1980. He has covered and analyzed six presidential elections.
@craasch
C-SPAN Video
Muck Rack
Thursday, February 16
Lee Rainie
Lee Rainie is the Director of Internet, Science, and Technology research at the Pew Research Center, a non-profit, non–partisan “fact tank” that studies the social impact of the internet.
His Project was described by the American Sociological Association as the “most authoritative source of reliable data on the use and impact of the internet and mobile connectivity” and the ASA awarded him and the Internet Project its award for “excellence in the reporting on social issues award” in 2014.
The Project has issued more than 600 reports based on its surveys that examine people’s online activities and the internet’s role in their lives. The Pew Research Center also has launched a sustained study of the intersection of science and society that Lee oversees. All of its reports and datasets are available online for free at: www.pewinternet.org
Lee is a co-author of Networked: The new social operating system with sociologist Barry Wellman about the social impact of the internet and cell phones. He is also co-author of five books about the future of the internet that are based on Project surveys about the subject.
Prior to launching the Pew Internet Project, Lee was managing editor of U.S. News & World Report.
Digital Divides - Feeding America
Thursday, March 23
Howard Schneider
Howard Schneider, the founding dean of the School of Journalism at Stony Brook University, spearheaded the team that developed the proposal for the State University of New York system’s first and only journalism school in 2006.
He has devoted more than 35 years to Newsday, as a reporter and editor, and won eight Pulitzer Prizes. He is also executive director of the school’s Center for News Literacy, which teaches students and journalists how to become more discerning news consumers.
Prior to his start at Stony Brook in 1980 as an adjunct professor, he taught journalism at Queens College in 1979.
Schneider was the recipient in 2012 of the DeWitt Reddick Award for Public Communications and Journalism Education, granted by the University of Texas. In 2003, he was awarded the Columbia Graduate School of Journalism Alumnus Award. He earned his bachelor’s degree at Syracuse University in Journalism and Psychology.
The Center for News Literacy (YouTube)
Digital Resource Center
Journalism dean: Fake news a "global concern" (YouTube)
Thursday, April 6
John A. Farrell
John A. Farrell is an American journalist and author. He has written the new biography “Richard Nixon: The Life,” “Clarence Darrow: Attorney for the Damned,” a biography of America's greatest defense attorney and “Tip O’Neill and the Democratic Century.” He is a contributing editor to Politico Magazine, after a prize-winning career as a newspaperman, most notably at The Denver Post and The Boston Globe, where he worked as White House correspondent and served on the vaunted “Spotlight” team. His biography of Clarence Darrow was awarded the Los Angeles Times book prize for the best biography of 2011. Other accolades include the Gerald R. Ford prize and the Aldo Beckman Award from the White House Correspondents Association for coverage of the presidency, the 2001 Raymond Clapper Memorial Award for distinguished Washington reporting, the 1990 Roy Howard Public Service Prize and a George Polk Award in 1984. Farrell has guest lectured for classes at colleges including Harvard University, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the United States Military Academy.
Thursday, October 5
David Lightman
"The Bumpy Road Ahead for Congress: A Look at the 2018 Elections"
McClatchy Washington Bureau national correspondent
David Lightman is the national political correspondent and congressional reporter for McClatchy Newspapers. A former managing editor of the Diamondback, he has worked at the Baltimore Evening Sun, where he covered the Maryland General Assembly, and was Washington Bureau Chief of the Hartford Courant from 1984 to 2007. He is a member of the Gridiron Club and is current chairman of Congress’ Standing Committee of Correspondents. He has taught at the University of Maryland since 1994.
Twitter: @LightmanDavid
and
William G. Douglas
McClatchy Washington Bureau national correspondent
William G. Douglas is currently the congressional correspondent for McClatchy Newspapers and co-host of Majority Minority, a McClatchy podcast that focuses on the impact of minorities in Washington politics and beyond. Douglas started out as a reporter for The Charlotte Observer in 1980. He then moved on to report for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, The Evening Sun, and New York Newsday. In 1993, he became the congressional correspondent for New York Newsday until 1997 when he transitioned to White House correspondent. From 2001 to 2003, Douglas was the foreign affairs correspondent for New York Newsday. While Douglas is working for the McClatchy Newspapers, he also created the blog “The Color of Hockey,” focusing on the under-told story of the history and growing impact of people of color in ice hockey, on and off the ice.
Twitter: @williamgdouglas
Tuesday, October 24
Ben Taub
"Smugglers, Jihadis and Spies: A brief guide to fraught encounters"
Staff Writer at the New Yorker
Ben Taub joined The New Yorker as a staff writer in 2017. He has written for the magazine about jihadi recruitment in Europe, war crimes in Syria, battlefield medicine, and human trafficking along the trans-Saharan migration routes from Nigeria to Italy. In 2014, he received a B.A. in philosophy from Princeton; the next year, he completed an M.A. in politics at Columbia’s Graduate School of Journalism. In 2017, Taub’s work on Syria, which was supported by the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting, was short-listed for a National Magazine Award and won the Livingston Award for International Reporting, the Robert F. Kennedy Award for International Print reporting, and the Overseas Press Club Award for Investigative Reporting; and Taub received the ASME Next Award for Journalists Under 30.
Twitter: @bentaub91
Webpage: NewYorker.com
Back To TopThursday, November 17, 2016
Stephen R. Kappes
Former Deputy Director of the CIA and Chief Operating Officer at Torch Hill Investment Partners
Stephen R. Kappes is the former Deputy Director of the United States Central Intelligence Agency, having served in the CIA from 1981 through 2010 with a two-year hiatus. A veteran of the United States Marine Corp, Kappes is recognized for his long career with the CIA and for his role in persuading Libyan leader Muammar al-Gaddafi to abandon his nuclear weapons program in 2003. He is also known for his guidance of the Agency’s operations and technical programs against foreign espionage threats. From 2006 to 2010, he was involved in the leadership and management of all elements of the Agency under two different Directors and two Presidential administrations. He currently serves as partner and COO at Torch Hill Investment Partners. He has extensive overseas experience, with assignments in the Middle East, Asia and Europe. Kappes holds an M.Sc. in Pathology from Ohio State University and a B.Sc. degree in Pre-Medicine from Ohio University.
Tuesday, October 4, 2016
Roger Thurow
Journalist, Author and Senior Fellow at Chicago Council on Global Affairs
Author and journalist Roger Thurow is a Senior Fellow in the Global Food and Agriculture Program at the Chicago Council on Global Affairs. He is a former correspondent for the Wall Street Journal and has been widely recognized for his writing about world hunger. With co-writer Scott Kilman, Thurow was a finalist for the 2004 Pulitzer Prize in International Reporting for their coverage of famine in Africa. His coverage of global affairs has spanned the Cold War, the fall of the Berlin Wall, the release of Nelson Mandela, the end of apartheid, the wars in the former Yugoslavia and recent humanitarian crises. He is the co-author of the book Enough: Why the World’s Poorest Starve in an Age of Plenty (2010) and the author of the books The Last Hunger Season: A Year in an African Farm Community on the Brink of Change (2013) and The First 1,000 Days: A Crucial Time for Mothers and Children, and the World (2016). A resident of Washington D.C., Thurow is a frequent lecturer on agricultural development and world economics.
Tuesday, September 27, 2016
Stan Collender
Founder of “Capital Gains and Games” blog on Forbes.com and National Director of Financial Communications of Qorvis MSLGROUP
As Qorvis MSLGROUP’s Executive Vice President and National Director of Financial Communications, Stan Collender is one of the world’s leading experts on the U.S. congressional budget process. He has worked for the House and Senate Budget Committees and has worked for three U.S. representatives on the House Budget and Ways and Means Committees. Collender was appointed by President Clinton to the presidential commission that studied whether the U.S. should have a capital budget. He writes the popular weekly column, “Fiscal Fitness,” in Roll Call, the influential Capitol Hill newspaper. He is also the founder and principal writer of “Capital Gains and Games,” which the Wall Street Journal has called one of the top 25 economic and financial blogs in the U.S. Additionally, Collender is the author of The Guide to the Federal Budget, one of the most assigned texts on the subject. Collender holds a bachelor’s degree in politics and psychology from New York University and a master’s degree in public policy (MPP) from the University of California, Berkeley.
Thursday, March 17, 2016
Doyle McManus
Washington columnist for the Los Angeles Times
Thursday, February 11, 2016
Dan Fagin
Science Journalism Professor at New York University
Thursday, January 21, 2016
Sandy Johnson
President and Chief Operating Officer of the National Press Foundation
Thursday, November 19, 2015
Ken Walsh
Chief White House correspondent for U.S. News & World Report
Tuesday, October 6, 2015
Alan Gomez
USA Today immigration reporter
Tuesday, September 15, 2015
Stan Collender
National Director of Financial Communications at Qorvis MSLGROUP
Tuesday, Mar. 10, 2015
Allan Sloan
Sloan was previously Newsweek's Wall Street editor. Before his 12-year stint at Newsweek, he was a columnist at Newsday and also held positions at Forbes and Money, among other publications.
Sloan is a seven-time winner of the prestigious Gerald Loeb Award, business journalism's highest honor. He has received Loeb awards in four different decades in four different categories for five different employers, one of which is FORTUNE. He has won numerous other awards and honors during his 40-year business-journalism career. In 2001 he received both the Loeb Lifetime Achievement Award and the Distinguished Achievement Award from the Society of American Business Editors and Writers.??
Sloan received a B.A. from Brooklyn College and an M.S. from Columbia Journalism School. A native of Brooklyn, he resides in New Jersey with his wife. They have threegrown children and two grandchildren.
Tuesday, Feb. 10, 2015
Evan Thomas
Author, Journalist, former editor-at-large, Newsweek
Tuesday, Sept. 23, 2014
Paul Taylor
Author and Executive Vice President for Special Projects for Pew Research Center
"The Next America"
“The key factors driving demographic change in the early 21st century really are immigration, the aging of the baby boom generation, the increase in longevity, the decline in marriage and the rise of economic inequality,” says Taylor. “All of these changes have produced an American population in which young and old don't look, think or vote alike. And while generation gaps are nothing new, today's are unusually large, and potentially fraught.”
Tuesday, Oct. 7, 2014
Jennifer Preston
Reporter and editor, New York Times
“Reporting and Storytelling in the Age of Social Media”
“A lot of journalists focus on using these tools to build their brands. That is important, of course,” says Preston. “But it is also important that we keep the focus on how we can use these tools for journalism.”
Thursday, Nov. 13, 2014
Healthcare Industry Professional Panel
John Rother, President and CEO of the National Coalition on Health Care, Joseph Gordy, President and CEO of Flagler Hospital, and Howard Gleckman, author of “Caring for Our Parents: Inspiring Stories of Families Seeking New Solutions to America’s Most Urgent Health Care Crisis.”
“Obamacare: A Year Later"
One year after the unveiling of President Barack Obama's highly controversial healthcare overhaul, industry professionals gathered to discuss the program.
