Meet Our Mentors

NewsHive at St. Joseph’s College

RobertSEshelmanHeadShot Robert S. Eshelman (@RobertSEshelman) is Environment Editor at VICE News and worked on the Emmy-winning climate change series Years of Living Dangerously, which aired on Showtime in 2014. His articles have appeared in The American Prospect, ClimateWire, Columbia Journalism Review, Scientific American, The Nation, and Mother Jones, among other publications.

Katie Honan (@katie_honan; http://www.KatieHonan.com) covers Jackson Heights, Elmhurst, Corona and the Rockaway peninsula for DNAinfo New York, New York City’s leading local news site. She joined DNAinfo.com from WNBC/Channel 4, where she was the station’s first social media editor and also worked as a web editor at NBCNewYork.com. While at NBC, she was part of breaking news teams that won a regional Emmy award for coverage of the Empire State Building shooting, and regional and national Emmy awards for their Hurricane Sandy coverage. They also won an Edward R. Murrow award for coverage of the 2012 storm.Before journalism she worked in film and television production, holding nearly every job with the word “assistant” in the title. Her first job out of college was at the “Late Show with David Letterman,” and I worked on movie and TV sets throughout the city.

mebandwNicholas Martinez (@mongonyc; http://www.nicholascmartinez.com/) became a journalist because he wanted to be part of the solution, not the problem. An alumnus of the City University of New York’s Graduate School of Journalism, he used the skills and fundamentals acquired from the program’s innovative curriculum to be the voice of the voiceless, to give the little man a bullhorn to tell his story. His efforts have led him to work for major institutions like the adidas Grand Prix, NBC News and the American Red Cross; while his multimedia articles have graced the digital and print pages of the New York Daily News, AM NY and the New York Times’ Local Blog just to name a few.

BioPicRoxanne Scott (@WhosWorld;
http://www.roxannelscott.com) is a Tow-Knight Fellow at CUNY where she learns about cool things at the intersection of journalism and entrepreneurship. Her work can be found on NPR’s Latino USA, Voices of New York and Youth Today. She is also a project coordinator for Social Media Week Lagos, Africa’s largest tech conference.

Matt Surrusco (@mattsurrusco, http://www.mattsurrusco.com) is a freelance journalist and copy editor at Truthout.org. He earned a M.A. in journalism with a concentration in international reporting from the CUNY Graduate School of Journalism. Matt has reported from Jerusalem for +972 Magazine, covering a vibrant activist community and interviewing Israeli and Palestinian leaders in the human rights sector. His work has been published in World Policy Journal, The Daily Beast, +972 Magazine and Truthout, among other outlets.

JuliaValleraJulia Vallera (@colorwheelz; http://juliavallera.com/) has been working in the arts as an educator, printmaker, public engagement artist, illustrator, consultant and designer for 16 years. She is a technology enthusiast and collaborates with many people to invent new ways to use it for STEAM (Science, Tech, Engineering, Arts, Math) education. As Programs Manager at Mozilla Hive NYC Julia works with more than 70 cultural organizations to create new learning pathways and innovative educational practices for youth, educators, families, artists, technologists and more.

THE JUDGES

ledmondsonLawrence Edmondson (@ledmondson;   http://www.linkedin.com/in/ledmondson) grew up in the inner city of Bridgeport Connecticut. Through hard work, dedication and being lucky enough to have good mentors, he went to college and learned computer programming. Though he couldn’t afford to finish school, he started working as a web master for Modem Media, one of the first digital agencies.  The experience he has gained in the Advertising field over the past 20 years has truly changed his life.  Through mentorship, Lawrence is eager to change the lives of others as well. Lawrence is currently the Vice President of Technology and User Experience at RFI Studios.

Pic 4.15Theodore (Ted) Hamm (@HammerDaily) is chair of journalism and new media studies at St. Joseph’s College, Brooklyn. He was a co-founder ofThe Brooklyn Rail and editor from 2000-2013. Over the past year he’s written for publications including Vice News, NY Daily News, the Columbia Journalism Review, City Limits and Gotham Gazette. His books include Rebel and a Cause (2001),TheNew Blue Media (2008), and Pieces of a Decade (co-edited with Williams Cole, 2010). His current projects include a history of freedom of the press.

NewsHive at CUNY J School

Julia Alsop a freelance reporter specializing in audio storytelling. Her work has appeared on NPR’s LatinoUSA, WNYC and PRX’s the Heart. She is currently a Reporting Fellow at CUNY’s Graduate School of Journalism.
Work samples: http://latinousa.org/2014/08/15/sylvia-rivera/
http://www.theheartradio.org/episodes/beautyispain
http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/exclusive-mold-ridden-nycha-buildings-bad-asthma-article-1.2045331

headshot1Monica Castillo (@mcastimovies; http://www.ibtimes.com/reporters/monica-castillo) is an Entertainment Reporter with a love of all things film. She’s traveled to several film festivals, met a few of cinema legends, and has some great stories about hitchhiking to red carpet premieres. She can usually be found online talking about the film she just watched.

Joanna-headshotJoanna Fantozzi (@JoannaFantozzi; http://www.joannafantozzi.com) is a features journalist with a strong passion for storytelling. Currently, she is an associate editor and food writer with The Daily Meal. She has been published in The New York Times, The New York Daily News, Straus News, The New York Observer, and Narratively. She got the reporter’s bug at the CUNY Graduate School of Journalism, where she graduated with an MA in Arts & Culture Reporting in December 2012, and a thesis on the Death of Little Italy in New York. Joanna also served as a judge for this year’s SPJ Deadline Club Journalism Awards.

Kirsti Itameri (@KirstiItameri; http://www.kirstiitameri.com) is a Brooklyn-based multimedia journalist, photographer and graphic designer. She graduated from Parsons School of Design with a BFA in photography in 2006 and completed an MA in journalism at the CUNY Graduate School of Journalism in 2011. Itameri has worked in Egypt as a print and photojournalist and was the recipient of a 2012 John F. Kennedy Center Europe Journalism Award for I Marched Along, an interactive multimedia project focused on the future of women in post-revolution Egypt. She was previously the contributing editor at the Council on Foreign Relations’ Campaign 2012 blog and is currently a multimedia producer at WNET’s MetroFocus.

Derek Kravitz (@derekkravitz; http://www.derekkravitz.com) is a research scholar at the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism, working on a forthcoming book project and assisting with teaching and curriculum for graduate-level journalism courses. Kravitz is also a contributing writer and news editor at The Wall Street Journal, focusing on politics, crime and business in greater New York. He was a fellow at Columbia University’s Stabile Center for Investigative Journalism in 2012-13 and graduated from Columbia’s School of International and Public Affairs with a master’s degree in international security policy.

mebandwNicholas Martinez (@mongonyc; http://www.nicholascmartinez.com/) became a journalist because he wanted to be part of the solution, not the problem. An alumnus of the City University of New York’s Graduate School of Journalism, he used the skills and fundamentals acquired from the program’s innovative curriculum to be the voice of the voiceless, to give the little man a bullhorn to tell his story. His efforts have led him to work for major institutions like the adidas Grand Prix, NBC News and the American Red Cross; while his multimedia articles have graced the digital and print pages of the New York Daily News, AM NY and the New York Times’ Local Blog just to name a few.

2015-03-08 15.17.43Ali Post (http://www.cargocollective.com/apost) has been working in radio for the past 5 years. As an undergrad student, she was the Program Director at Oberlin’s college and community station. She has also worked with StoryCorps, Radio Diaries, and Radio Rookies. Ali is interested in the intersection of storytelling, education, and community-generated media content.

Jackie Snow (@jackiesnow http://jsnowphoto.com/) grew up on a small island off the coast of Fort Myers, Fla. In college in California she discovered the joys of photography and started focusing on visual storytelling. She moved to NYC and worked as a photographer and editor at Patrick McMullan Company and went to CUNY’s Graduate School of Journalism in 2011 to work out some kinks in her writing and to learn video and radio. Since then, she’s been published by National Geographic, WNYC, Vanity Fair, The Atlantic, New York Times and Wall Street Journal, for words, audio and video stories. She’s left-handed, studying Portuguese for fun and despite her last name, had never seen snow fall until she was 22.

 THE JUDGES

harrellJoe_casualJoe Harrell has over 15 years of experience building products and engaging audiences on digital platforms. He is currently the Senior Director of Digital Strategy and Executive Producer of First Person, a new online original series, at WNET, where he works on audience development, revenue models, brand management and programming development on web, mobile, social media and digital video platforms.

Kayle-400pixelsKayle Hope is a video journalist, photographer and media educator based in New York City. She has worked as a reporter and teacher in Cambodia, China and Bhutan. Her work has appeared in The Cambodia Daily, The Mott Haven Herald and in film festivals around the world. One of her shorts was recently screened at the Brooklyn Academy of Music’s Puppets on Film Festival. Kayle just received her Master’s degree from the CUNY Graduate School of Journalism where she focused on international reporting and video storytelling. She has led digital storytelling workshops worldwide with Youth Media Project in Santa Fe, New Mexico and the Bhutan Centre for Media and Democracy in Thimphu, Bhutan. Right now she is working on a media literacy trip where she is taking 12 American college students to a school in Ladakh, India where they will facilitate media workshops with local kids. Kayle is currently a Video Coach and Web Designer at the CUNY Graduate School of Journalism.

Ruth-Spencer-RRuth Spencer is the managing editor of the Guardian US — where she solves problems and makes stuff happen. Prior to that she was culture editor and community editor. She’s Canadian. She’s lived in the Netherlands. She’s also been to KazakhstanInline images 1. You can find her on Twitter @ruths.