Ten journalists from around the world are visiting the University of St. Thomas campus this summer as fellows of the World Press Institute, an international journalism program founded in 1961.
The World Press Institute fellows are spending three weeks at St. Thomas as part of their visit to the United States.
The journalists are from Australia, Bulgaria, China, Colombia, Finland, Ghana, Israel, Kuwait, the Philippines and Russia. They arrived Aug. 12 for a nine-week visit to the United States to study the free press and media innovations, and to learn about America's social and cultural diversity.
Following three weeks at St. Thomas, the fellows will travel around the country meeting with journalists, political, business and community leaders, and policy experts.
They will visit New York, Washington, D.C., Atlanta, Miami, Chicago, Austin and San Francisco, among other places, before returning to Minnesota for the final week of the program.
The fellows are:
- Australia: Carson Scott, anchor and chief business correspondent for Sky NewsBusiness television in Sydney.
- Bulgaria: Spas Spasov, editor and correspondent for Capital Daily, Capital Weekly, and Dnevnik.bg newspapers and website in Varna.
- China: Fu Tao, vice editor-in-chief for Caixin.com website in Beijing.
- Colombia: Diana Duran, judicial reporter for El Espectador newspaper in Bogota.
- Finland: Elina Lappalainen, columnist and business reporter for Talouselama magazine and website in Helsinki.
- Ghana: Veronica Kwabla, anchor and reporter for Tv3 Network Ltd. television in Accra.
- Israel: Ami Kaufman, co-founder and editor for +972 Magazine, a web magazine in Tel Aviv.
- Kuwait: Shakir Reshamwala, front page editor and columnist for Kuwait Times newspaper in Kuwait City.
- Philippines: Paul Henson, executive producer of news for ABS-CBN Broadcasting Corp. television in Quezon City.
- Russia: Vera Krichevskaya, writer and producer for The New Times magazine and formerly creative producer for 24DOC TV and TV Dozhd in Moscow.
A nonprofit organization based in the Twin Cities, The World Press Institute has 550 alumni in more than 95 countries.
The program’s mission is to promote journalistic professionalism and best practices outside the United States by exposing young and mid-career journalists from across the globe to the diversity of the United States, its media and its people, while at the same time encouraging adherence to the journalistic values of transparency, independence, accuracy and holding powerful institutions accountable.
The fellows' time at St. Thomas is supported by the dean's office of the College of Arts and Sciences. Seminars are provided by faculty, staff and alumni of the Department of Communication and Journalism and feature topics ranging from journalism history to the use of social media by reporters. Associate Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences Kris Bunton is a WPI board member.
For more information and photos of the 2013 fellows, visit the WPI website.
