TEAM

Ken Harper | Project Management

S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications, Assistant Professor
Syracuse University

Ken Harper started his professional career as a designer at Sun Publications in Chicago. Harper went on to join the features design staff at the Arizona Daily Star in Tucson, where he began his transition to new media design. Harper decided on a digital vagabond lifestyle, traveling around the country by motorcycle, designing on a freelance basis through his own company, IronCladImages.com. He has worked as a multimedia designer and producer for MSNBC.com, New York Life, Bausch & Lomb and various non-profit organizations including the United Nations, ElectronicIntifada.net and Aidchild.

Harper served as an interactive producer and designer at RockyMountainNews.com in Denver, Colorado, before becoming as Assistant Professor of Multimedia Photography and Design at the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications at Syracuse University, where his main interest of research and creative work is Liberia.

Michael Keating | Project Management

Center for Democracy & Development, Assistant Director
University of Massachusetts Boston

Michael Keating is the Associate Director and Senior Fellow at CDD. He is an expert in the area of media and business development with over twenty years experience as a management consultant and corporate execu- tive. Michael was formerly a Vice-President and Partner with the Boston Consulting Group and was also a vice- president and international project manager with the German media firm Bertelsmann. In 2005 Michael worked in Macedonia on the development of a national digital media strategy. He has also completed economic development projects in the Czech Republic, Russia and Romania.

In 2006, Michael!s focus has also been on Africa, primarily on developments in Liberia. His research and consult- ing interests are on the question of how to create sustainable media businesses in developing and post-conflict societies and how the media segment can best serve positive social outcomes in conflict-prone societies. He has conducted country risk studies in Nigeria and Zambia as part of his consulting activities and has also conducted specific sector studies in areas like cocoa production, mining and telecom.

Michael has a B.A. in Philosophy from Fordham University and pursued Graduate studies in Comparative Area studies at the University of Washington, where he also studied oriental languages. He has completed certificate programs on Corporate Finance topics at the Harvard Business School and the Amsterdam Institute of Finance topics at the Harvard Business School and the Amsterdam Institute of Finance. He was an Adjunct Faculty in the Management In- formation Systems Dept. at New York University in 1986. He has published several articles on “new media! and the internet, and as a Visiting Scholar at M.I.T. in 2002–2003, he researched and presented on the topic of the internet and political violence. In 2007 he was asked to participate in the annual “Business in Africa” conference held at the Harvard Business School.

John O. Kollie | Project Director

Liberia Media Initiative for Peace Democracy and Development, Executive Director

Founder and Executive Director, responsible for the management of the Liberia Media Initiative for Peace Democracy and Development, LMI including the staff project activities and finances. John O. Kollie has been the Executive Director LMI since its establishment. John is a Liberian journalist with 18 years of media experience. He has received awards for his investigative journalism and astute practice from the Press Union of Liberia, PUL and was awarded the prestigious National Endowment for Democracy, NED Fellowship at the Inter- national Forum Democratic Studies in Washington D.C. in 2006. John also works for Radio France International (RFI) as one of its senior English correspondents in West Africa. He works for the BBC World Service Trust (WST) coordinating a team of eight reporters from Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea covering the trial of former Liberian president Charles Taylor before the UN backed Special Court for Sierra sitting at the International Criminal Court in the Hague. John is also engaged with the Washington Based Search for Common Ground supervising the me- dia activities of the organization!s multi media Liberian project called the Talking Drum Studio. John is an astute radio and TV program producer and presenter.

Rodney Sieh | Liberian Media

Front Page Africa, Editor and Publisher

Front Page Africa, Publisher Rodney D. Sieh is a veteran Liberian journalist with more than fifteen years experience. During the height of the civil war in Liberia, he covered the war as a senior reporter for the Monrovia Daily News, venturing on the frontlines with ECOMOG peacekeepers to report on the casualties and progress of the devastating war. In 1992, Sieh fled Liberia for Gambia to help his uncle Kenneth Best run the independent Daily Observer. While in Gambia, Sieh became a correspondent for the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC). When Yahya Jammeh and a corps of low-ranked officers seized power from Sir Dawda Jawara, Sieh braved the skirmishes of gunfire and ventured to State House, where he scored the first interview with the new ruler and his key lieutenants. Despite Jammeh!s pledge to distinguish himself from other African dictators before him, the aftermath of the coup saw a string of disappearances and mysterious killings. When Sieh!s uncle, Mr. Best, was arrested in late September 1994, Sieh broke the news on the BBC. Soon after, Jammeh!s forces went out in search of him, forcing Sieh into hiding. Mr. Sieh fled The Gambia in November 1994 for London, England en route to the United States.

A graduate with honors in Media Studies from Hunter College, Mr. Sieh has worked with several U.S. newspapers including Newport News, Syracuse Post Standard and the Daily Record. He worked as an intern at several pub- lications, including the Newark Star Ledger, the Kansas City Star. At Hunter College, Sieh initiated and helped launch the first online college newspaper, The Word, which many students past and present use to build their resumes and journalism credentials to find jobs.

Today he, along with a small team of dedicated staff, has successfully transformed these news visual and investi- gative skills into the widely-read FrontPageAfrica.com, which was launched in June 2005 and now enjoys almost 20 million visitors a month. FrontPageAfrica, along with other civil society groups, have been at the forefront of ef- forts to strengthen Liberia!s new democracy which, if it is to be sustainable, must be built on the rule of law, good governance and respect for Human rights. In this respect, FrontPageAfrica has been at the forefront of the battle to expose corruption and acts inimical to good governance in Liberia that has earned it the respect and admiration of the Liberian populace. The stories published by FrontPageAfrica have led to specific policy reforms to strengthen Liberia!s new democratic institutions and to provide greater transparency and public accountancy in government, but these struggles are far from over and must be sustained at all levels.

Continuing its hard-hitting cutting-edge approach, FrontPageAfrica in December 2009 launched its print version and has already rocketed to the most circulated and most widely read newspaper in Liberia today.

ENDORSEMENTS/SUPPORTING ORGANIZATIONS | US

• S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications, Syracuse University
• Alexia Foundation for World Peace and Understanding
• Graduate Program in International Affairs, New School University
• Center for Democracy and Development, University of Massachusetts Boston
• Chapel Hill School of Journalism and Mass Communication, The University of North Carolina
• School of Journalism and Communication, University of Oregon
• Ushahidi, Ushahidi.com
• Ruthie Ackerman, ceasefireliberia.com
• Joe Weiss, soundslides.com
• Wijmo, Query UI Widgets

ENDORSEMENTS/SUPPORTING ORGANIZATIONS | Liberia

• John Kollie, Managing Director, LMIPDD (media NGO)
• Lawrence Randall, Managing Director, Liberian Media Center
• Joe Mulbah, Chairman of Mass Communications, University of Liberia
• Rodney Sieh, Editor, Front Page Africa Communications
• Tom Kamara, Publisher, New Democrat Newspaper
• Ada Weah, Managing Director, Radio Veritas
• Press Union of Liberia
• Dr. Henry Tokpa, Cuttington University President
• Malcolm Joseph, Managing Director, Center for Media Studies and Peace Building
• Tetee C. Karneh, Station Manager, Liberian Women Media Action Committee

Trainers

Steve Davis | Print Reporting

S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications, Chair, Magazine Newspaper and Online Journalism
Syracuse University

I have worked in newsrooms of all kinds and of all sizes, as a manager, editor, writer and page designer.

At my last stop before Newhouse, I was executive editor at the community newspaper in Chambersburg, Pa., for the six years. I arrived here in 1999.

I was national editor and then Washington editor at USA Today from 1985 to 1992, including one year as the lead editor directing the newspaper’s coverage of the Persian Gulf War.

In the years prior to USA Today, I worked in Jackson, Miss., and Rochester, N.Y., on the sports, local and national desks. I also spent a year in the mid-1980s working for Gannett Co. Inc. in Washington, D.C., on a research and development project to create some of the earliest prototypes for personalized, online news.

I graduated from the University of Missouri School of Journalism with a bachelor’s degree in 1977.

For one of my first projects here, I wrote a book analyzing the effect of the Internet on the 2000 elections, the first “wired” campaign. (“Click on Democracy: The Power of the Internet to Change Political Apathy into Civic Action,” was published by Westview Press.)

Sung Park | Multimedia Reporting

School of Journalism and Communication, Instructor of Photojournalism and Multimedia
University of Oregon

Sung Park is an Instructor of Photojournalism and Multimedia at the University of Oregon School of Journalism and Communication. He taught previously as an assistant professor and adjunct at The Newhouse School of Public Communications at Syracuse University and at The University of Texas at Austin. He previously worked as a photojournalist and picture editor at the Austin American-Statesman for 14 years. Park is an award winning photojournalist who has been published nationally and internationally. He has a B.S. in Photoillustration and an M.F. A. in Transmedia from Syracuse University.

Chad Stevens | Multimedia Reporting

School of Journalism and Mass Communication, Assistant Professor
University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill

Chad A. Stevens joined the school in 2009. Most recently, he was an award-winning documentary producer/editor at Mediastorm, a multimedia production company based in New York City. Stevens has also been a faculty member in the visual communication programs at Western Kentucky University, the International Center of Photography and Ohio University. Currently he is working on a feature length documentary film on the conflict over energy extraction in Appalachia.

Stevens has received two Emmy nominations, one Webby Award and many photography and multimedia awards in the Pictures of the Year International and NPPA Best of Photojournalism competitions. While teaching at Western Kentucky University, Stevens won the University Faculty Award for Public Service in 2006.

With a professional foundation in photojournalism and multimedia storytelling, Stevens’ career spans the spectrum of newsroom environments, multimedia production and international experience. While living in Africa, he produced multimedia projects for Save the Children, AIDchild and Literacy and Basic Education.

He is a 1999 graduate of Western Kentucky University and a 2009 graduate of Ohio University, and has interned at National Geographic Magazine, The Hartford Courant, the Muskegon Chronicle and the Jackson Hole Guide. During his time as a student at Western Kentucky University, he traveled to Palestine and other Middle East countries. He was named 1997 College Photographer of the Year.

Bruce Strong | Multimedia Reporting

S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications, Assistant Professor
Syracuse University

Bruce Strong is a multimedia storyteller who likes to work with cool people on awesome projects. Life is too short to do anything else. He has shot in nearly 60 countries, with Sudan added to the mix this March.

Bruce was on staff at The Orange County Register in Southern California for 11 years and has freelanced for a variety of international publications and non-profit organizations. His work has earned numerous awards and two fellowships—The Knight-Wallace Journalism Fellowship at the University of Michigan and the Knight Fellowship at Ohio University. When he’s not on the field, Bruce spends a lot of time helping others learn to tell stories of significance.

Currently, he’s an associate professor at Syracuse University’s S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications, where he teaches an array of video, audio, photography and multimedia courses. Teaching has been a rewarding and enlightening journey, and he is proud of his students, many of whom—while still students—have won top honors from NPPA, POY, World Press and BOP. He also had the good fortune of mentoring back-to-back College Photographer of the Year winners, Matt Eich and Travis Dove.

This year, Bruce was honored with a 2010 Meredith Teaching Recognition Award from Syracuse University and the National Press Photographers Association’s Robin F. Garland Educator of the Year Award. But Bruce is most proud of his two young sons, Jack and Cole, and loves adventuring through life with his visual journalist/professor wife, Claudia.

Monitoring and Evaluation

Luisa Ryan | Monitoring and Evaluation

University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, Rotary World Peace Fellow

Luisa Ryan is a Rotary World Peace Fellow at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, studying a Masters of Journalism and Mass Communication. Her research interests include the role of local journalists in peace building efforts in conflict-affected countries, and the role of media and national identity in conflict. This summer, she will travel to Liberia to take part in a project training local journalists on election coverage. She graduated from the University of Queensland, Australia, in 2003 with an Arts degree (French, Spanish and International Relations) and a Sociology degree with Honors, specializing in nationalism studies. After graduation, she participated in a tolerance education program in Poland, interned with the Australian Mission to the UN in New York, and worked as a research assistant for International Crisis Group in Brussels and Nepal before commencing work with the United Nations. Luisa worked as a Monitoring and Evaluation Specialist in remote communities in Nepal with UNFPA before joining the United Nations Mission in Nepal’s Office of Civil Affairs to monitor Nepal’s fledgling peace process. In 2008, Luisa returned to Australia to lead Australian Red Cross Queensland’s International Programs department, before taking up her Rotary fellowship at the University of North Carolina.

Chris Giamo | Documentary Film

S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications, Master’s Candidate

Chris Giamo is a graduate of the University of Notre Dame, and is currently completing his MA in Documentary Film and History at Syracuse University . He has a background in cultural anthropology, human rights, South Asian studies, and Hindi language. He recently completed a documentary on Kashmir, India which was shot during the summer of 2010. The film, In Shopian, covers the case of a double murder and documents the volatile socio-political upheaval in the capital of Srinagar. He has also conducted extensive fieldwork within Sikh diaspora communities in Canada and England. His film Black Days/Blue Star recounts the story of a Sikh refugee who escaped the Indian Army’s attack on the Golden Temple in June, 1984. Besides human rights documentaries, Chris has made a number of independent art films. He currently resides in an attic by the sea in Portland, Maine.

Andrew Hida | Multimedia Journalist

S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications, Master’s Candidate

Andrew was born and raised in Honolulu, Hawaii and is currently a master’s candidate in photography at Syracuse University, and a Carnegie-Knight Syracuse News21 fellow. Hida has worked as a freelance documentary photographer and multimedia storyteller in Seattle, Washington. His work has been funded through numerous awards, including the Seattle Office of Arts & Cultural Affairs, 4Culture, and the Photo Center Northwest. His multimedia projects have been been exhibited throughout Washington, most recently at the Wing Luke Asian Museum in Seattle. He graduated in 2005 from the University of Washington with a bachelor’s degree in conservation ecology and Spanish.

Bob Miller | Multimedia Training

S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications, Master’s Candidate

Bob Miller is a freelance photographer and multimedia storyteller. Originally educated in graphic design, Bob began photographing when he discovered his love for the photographic essay. Since 2006, his work has drawn him to Kenya, Sudan, Bolivia, Mexico and the United Kingdom and has been recognized by the College Photographer of the Year competition, the International Photography Awards, the Alexia Foundation for World Peace, and recently exhibited at the Getty Images Gallery in London and the powerHouse Gallery in Brooklyn, NY. As a freelancer, Bob has covered human interest and conflict stories, as well as an international music tour for Universal Music Group. Specializing in multimedia storytelling for editorial, non-profit and corporate clients, Bob implements a variety of media to give stories their most appropriate voice. He is currently a graduate student in photography and multimedia at the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communication at Syracuse University.

David Miller | Lead Designer

S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications, Graphic Design Student

David is a student at the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications at Syracuse University. He has a passion for graphic design, photojournalism, and illustration photography. His photos have appeared in: The Daily Orange, Jerk Magazine, The Onion A.V. Club Chicago, The British Independent Film Awards, Raindance.tv, and Ralph Lauren’s Rugby.com. David was recently named the Society of News Design/Marshall Matlock student designer of 2009.

Most recently, David spent 7 weeks living in the woods of Northeastern Washington state as a Syracuse University fellow for the Carnegie-Knight News21 initiative. As graphic designer for the Syracuse News21 team, David designed apartfromwar.org, as well as the information graphics that appear as part of the team’s project, which explored the consequences of war and veteran issues including healthcare, divorce, suicide, and living off the grid.

David Eugene Trotman-Wilkins | Multimedia Training

S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications, Graduate Student

David Eugene Trotman-Wilkins is an award winning photographer with Chicago Tribune in their Vernon Hills Bureau. David graduated from Syracuse University, deciding on a dual major of study in Sociology and Photojournalism with a minor emphasis in geology.

It was in the spring of 1987 that David’s professional career in daily newspaper photojournalism as a staff photojournalist began with the Syracuse Newspapers for the next 6 years. Working in two of their suburban bureaus, Oneida and Cayuga Counties covering the news makers, people, culture, politics and events of Upstate New York’s Finger Lakes area.

David then tackled the challenges of learning photo editing with the Milwaukee Sentinel and later the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. Learning the art of photo editing and page design at the Kalish Photographic Workshop, Poynter Institute, Society of Newspaper Design and the NABJ Visual Task Force professional seminars. Taking on the task of planning, and assigning photographic news coverage, photo editing, page layout and design for the daily paper.

After five years David sought additional growth opportunities, joining the Chicago Tribune as one of their suburban Assistant. Source Editors and photographic bureau chiefs. David was responsible for the photographic news coverage for the Tribune’s NorthWest bureau, managiong a staff of five photojournalists, covering Northwest Cook, Northern Kane, McHenry and Lake Counties in Illinois, as well as South East Wisconsin. David returned to his photographic roots, of making pictures and telling stories in 2005. With a decline in readership over the past ten years newspapers found themselves downsizing, David left the Tribune in 2009.

Currently David is enrolled with Syracuse Univeristy’s Newhouse Masters Program in the Photography/Multimedia Department. Studying with industry leaders and award winning professors as Anthony Golden, Bruce Strong, Tom Kennedy, Lawrence Doc Mason, Doug Wonders, David Sutherland, Ken Harper, Sherri Taylor to name a few. With an emphasis on visual communications, specifically multimedia production, using the latest technologies; David is expanding his skill set as he prepares for the challenges of visual journalism in the 21st century.

David has been honored throughout his career by the Syracuse Press Club, the National Press Photographers Association Region 2, and the National Association of Black Journalists Visual Task Force in their annual “Shoot-out” competition in 1997, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2004 and 2006. David also joined a group of African-American photographers in Chicago, The Chicago Alliance of African-American Photographers, which documented Chicago’s African-American community in 2000. The effort was viewed by thousands of visitors to the Museum of Contemporary Art and several other venues over the next several years including a book published in 2005. Currently David has work exhibited with CAAAP members at the Carter G. Woodson Library in Chicago throughout 2011.

Cameron Zohoori | Multimedia Training

Robertson Scholar, Duke University

Cameron is a Robertson Scholar at Duke University and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He is studying Neuroscience, Philosophy, and Marine Science and Policy, while pursuing his passion for documentary film and photography. He spent summer 2009 using radio to reconnect Kentucky prisoners with their families, while working with the Thousand Kites organization at the Appalshop media collective. Summer of 2010 he was in the village of Manomenima in rural Sierra Leone working on a grassroots community development initiative. His photos have been featured in Al Jazeera English, the Duke Arts Festival, and the Duke Chronicle. Cameron is excited about using media to tell stories in new ways and change the way people think.