Shorenstein Center Names Fall Fellows

The former director of international public broadcaster Voice of America and two foreign correspondents will join the Kennedy School of Government's Shorenstein Center on Media, Politics, and Public Policy as fellows this fall, the center announced Tuesday.

The three Joan Shorenstein fellows—former Voice of America director David Ensor, Lima bureau chief for Agence France Presse Marie Sanz, and BBC foreign correspondent Paul Wood—will research and publish a paper on a media- or policy-related topic while at Harvard. They join veteran CBS reporter and retired “Face the Nation” moderator Bob Schieffer, who will be in residence at least twice a semester until December 2016 as the school’s third Walter Shorenstein Media and Democracy fellow.

According to the center’s fellows program manager, Katie Miles, the Joan Shorenstein fellows are chosen in a “highly selective” application process, while the Walter Shorenstein Fellows are selected by invitation at the discretion of the Shorenstein center director with input from the Kennedy School dean and the fellowship’s donors, Doug and Lydia Shorenstein.

Ensor, who has also served as the communications director for the U.S. embassy in Kabul, Afghanistan, said he will focus on the topic of journalism and public diplomacy during his time at Harvard, examining how the U.S. can best communicate with the rest of the world.

“There are questions to be looked at about how you reach people, how you communicate with people, and then there are questions about what the message should be,” Ensor said. “We’re in the era of Russia Today and CCTV and PressTV in Iran—these are real challenges, how to respond to some of the often inaccurate information that is on them and widely disseminated.”

Wood, on the other hand, said he will examine moral dilemmas facing journalists in Syria, particularly when covering news related to the militant group that calls itself the Islamic State.

“In covering ISIS, you come up against all sorts of questions about how far you can go as a journalist, what you do to protect your sources, what you do to protect people who might be affected by your stories, where your duty lies,” Wood said.

Sanz, who reported on former Cuban President Fidel Castro’s final years in power, said she will write about the “changing relations between Cuba and the U.S. through the lens of the media.” The U.S. and Cuban governments restored diplomatic relations last month, the latest development in the so-called “Cuban Thaw.”

“This is for me really a time to think slowly about all the issues that I’ve covered, the way the world has changed,” Sanz added.