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Featured Speakers

Kevin Blackistone

Kevin Blackistone
2:30 p.m. Saturday, Nov. 23

Blackistone is a professor at the Merrill College of Journalism at the University of Maryland.

He is a longtime national sports columnist at The Washington Post, a panelist on ESPN’s “Around the Horn,” a contributor to National Public Radio and co-author of “A Gift for Ron,” a memoir by former NFL star Everson Walls.

Joie Chen

Joie Chen
9 a.m. Saturday, Nov. 23

Chen is director of D.C. programs for Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism, her alma mater. 

She’s been honored with multiple national Emmys and other awards for her reports at CBS News and at CNN, where she also anchored for a decade. 

More recently, Chen was anchor and senior correspondent of Al Jazeera America’s flagship current affairs program, “America Tonight.”    

Jahi Chikwendiu

Jahi Chikwendiu
1 p.m. Friday, Nov. 22

After teaching mathematics and freelancing at his hometown Lexington (Ky.) Herald-Leader, Chickwendiu joined The Washington Post photography staff in 2001.

Assignments have included 9/11 Marines, AIDS and poverty in Kenya, children in Uganda and D.C. public schools, Iraqi refugees and the Texas-Mexico border. His work has been recognized by groups such as White House News Photographers Association and Overseas Press Club.

Peter Copeland

Peter Copeland
1 p.m. Saturday, Nov. 23

Peter Copeland has been a war correspondent, Washington bureau chief and news executive.

He has covered stories in 30 countries during a 40-year career.

His new book, “Finding the News: Adventures of a Young Reporter,” is the fast-paced story of how he became a reporter and learned the values of quality journalism.

Dorothy B. Gilliam

Dorothy B. Gilliam
1 p.m. Friday, Nov. 22

The first black woman reporter at The Washington Post, Gilliam remained a trailblazer for a diversified newsroom and mentor to young reporters of color.

She became a Post editor and columnist, was host for her show on BET and appeared in civil-rights documentaries. 

She developed Post efforts to recognize excellence and develop skills in D.C.-area middle and high schools.  

“Trailblazer,” her memoir, was published in 2019.  

Mark Hyman

Mark Hyman
9 a.m. Friday, Nov. 22

A professor of sports business at George Washington University, journalist and lawyer, Hyman has written extensively about youth sports. 

His books about the troubled state of sports for children include “Concussions and Our Kids,” “The Most Expensive Game in Town” and “Until It Hurts.” 

Hyman’s latest project, a documentary film, “The Great China Baseball Hunt,” chronicles the search for the first Major League Baseball player from mainland China.

Kate Julian

Kate Julian
10 a.m. Friday, Nov. 22

Julian is a senior editor at The Atlantic, where she assigns and edits magazine articles.

She is also the author of the magazine’s December 2018 cover story, “The Sex Recession,” one of The Atlantic’s most-read pieces of 2018. 

Previously, Julian was deputy editor of The Washington Post’s Sunday Outlook section and managing editor of The New Yorker.

Jen Deerinwater

Jen Deerinwater
2 p.m. Friday, Nov. 22

A citizen of the Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma, bisexual, two-spirit, multiply-disabled journalist and organizer, Deerinwater covers the myriad of issues her communities face with an intersectional lens. 

She’s a contributor at Truthout, the founder and executive director of Crushing Colonialism and is Freedomways Reporting Project fellow. The Advocate named her one of their Oklahoma representatives for the 2019 Champions of Pride. 

Karla Flores

Karla Flores
10 a.m. Saturday, Nov. 23 

Flores is a bilingual reporter for both Telemundo44 and NBC4. 

She has been working in broadcast news with Telemundo Washington, D.C., since 2015. 

She graduated from George Mason University with a bachelor’s degree in communications with a concentration in journalism. She focuses on covering immigration and local community stories in Metro DC.

Lazaro Gamio
Harry Stevens

Lazaro Gamio & Harry Stevens
2 p.m. Friday, Nov. 22

Gamio is deputy managing editor for visuals at Axios, and Stevens is a visual journalist at The Washington Post.

Gamio leads a team that creates charts, maps, interactive graphics and editorial illustrations. Before Axios, he was an assignment editor in graphics at The Washington Post. He got his start at his hometown paper, the Miami Herald.    

Stevens uses data and graphics to report on the news. Before the Post, he worked at Axios and at the Hindustan Times, in New Delhi, India. 

Glenn Kessler

Glenn Kessler
11 a.m. Saturday, Nov. 23

Kessler has been editor and chief writer of The Washington Post’s Fact Checker column 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.     

Dana Priest

Dana Priest
10 a.m. Friday, Nov. 22

A Washington Post reporter and the Knight Chair in Public Affairs Journalism at the University of Maryland, Priest won the 2008 Pulitzer Prize for public service, the 2006 Pulitzer Prize for her reporting on CIA secret prisons and a 2019 George Foster Peabody Award for the “PBS Frontline” documentary, “The Facebook Dilemma.” 

She is the author of two best-selling books, “Top Secret America” and “The Mission.”  

Allison Shelley

Allison Shelley
11 a.m. Friday, Nov. 22

An independent documentary photographer and multimedia journalist based in Washington, D.C., Shelley is acting director of the Women Photojournalists of Washington and adjunct faculty at Northwestern’s Medill School of Journalism and at the Corcoran College of Art and Design at George Washington University. 

Previously, she worked as director of photography for Education Week newspaper and as a staff photographer for The Washington Times. 

Mary Beth Tinker

Mary Beth Tinker
Noon Friday, Nov. 22

2019 is the 50th anniversary of the landmark Supreme Court ruling Tinker v. Des Moines, which established the constitutional free speech rights of public school students. 

As one of the plaintiffs, Mary Beth Tinker travels the country on a Tinker Tour to promote youth rights, student journalism and civic engagement. 

She is a registered nurse with master’s degrees in nursing and public health. 

Matt Wuerker

Matt Wuerker
10 a.m. Saturday, Nov. 23

Staff cartoonist for Politico, Wuerker provides editorial cartoons, illustrations and caricatures for both print and online platforms. 

In 2010 he was awarded the Herblock Prize at the Library of Congress and won the National Press Foundation’s Berryman Award. He received the 2012 Pulitzer Prize in editorial cartooning. 

His work is widely received in dailies and magazines such as Newsweek, The Nation and The Smithsonian.