KipProgram

What is the Kiplinger Fellowship? A coveted Kiplinger Fellowship is a gateway to improving your skills and value as a professional journalist.

The Kiplinger Program in Public Affairs Journalism at Ohio University trains professional journalists in ways to create more dynamic and comprehensive coverage of the issues facing us today. Started in 1972 with a generous donation from the Kiplinger family in memory of patriarch Willard Kiplinger, a 1912 graduate of Ohio State University, and the founder of Kiplinger Newsletter and Kiplinger Pers

onal Finance magazine, the program marks 50 years in 2022. The fellowship is intended for professional journalists with at least five years of experience. It is not for academics, students, or those in other branches of communications. Once a 12-month sabbatical program with a master's degree at OSU, it has evolved over time. From 2009 until 2021 the program focused on digital tools and technology and trained more than 4,000 journalists in that span. Beginning in 2014, Kiplinger started taking its training methods on the road internationally. Since then, Kip has been in 10 counties offering a variety of training to international reporters, editors and producers. Additionally, Kiplinger has presented often at U.S. national journalism conferences since 2005. As we hit 50 years, Kiplinger is once again making changes to its fellowship. Today, there are growing, monumental issues that require extraordinary skills and resolve for proper coverage. Kiplinger will focus each year on one of these primary issues that indelibly mark our lives, whether its climate change, poverty, human rights, pandemics, drug crises, human trafficking, wealth inequity, government transparency, etc.

03/21/2025

And, with this post, we are at the end of introductions of fellows and speakers for the 2025 Kiplinger Fellowship in AI and Journalism.

Hannah Schmillen is the assistant dean for research and education at Ohio University’s libraries.
In her role as department head, she has developed a strategic vision and direction for the newly established department, fostering collaboration within her team. The Research Services Department supports Ohio University’s research enterprise as a trusted partner, with a focus on research services related to data, open science, scholarly impact, and student research and creative activity.
She has also been a key collaborator and innovator in the Libraries’ exploration and support of generative AI for the Ohio University community.
Throughout her career at Ohio University, one constant has been Schmillen’s role as the Health Sciences Librarian, a position she has held since 2015.
Over the years, she has cultivated strong relationships and deep collaborations with the College of Health Sciences and Professions, supporting hundreds of classes, students, and faculty in their courses and research endeavors.
Schmillen earned a master of library and information science from the University of Denver and a bachelor of biological sciences from Illinois State University.

03/20/2025

We turn to Ohio University for our next speaker, a member of the Scripps School of Journalism.

Dan Farkas is a professor of strategic communication at Ohio University, where he teaches research, strategy, content creation, measurement, and analytics courses.
He’s also a business owner when not chasing late homework or his two kids.
His latest venture is Pass PR, which aims to mind the gap between employer needs and employee capacity.
Dan’s been called "A recognized thought leader in the PR….he also is a sought-after speaker on both national and local levels who is an exceptional storyteller drawing on his collective experience as a former journalist and current practitioner and instructor." His book, Strategic Content Marketing: Creating Effective Content in Practice, is out now. You can also hear him on The Strategic Communicator Podcast, part of the Marketing Podcast Network.
In a former life, Dan earned more than 20 awards for his work in television news. His work appeared on CNN, MSNBC, and SI.com.

03/19/2025

From across the pond, our next speaker on AI during the Kiplinger Fellowship is from the London School of Economics and Political Science.

Tshepo Tshabalala is the Project Manager of JournalismAI, a research and training project run by Polis - the international journalism think-tank of the LSE – with support from the Google News Initiative.
JournalismAI aims to inform media organizations about the potential offered by AI-powered technologies. The project offers research reports, training materials, a network for best practice and innovation sharing and much more.
Prior to joining Polis and JournalismAI, Tshepo was Project Coordinator at the Journalism and Media Lab (Jamlab Africa), a project of the Wits Center for Journalism at Wits University. Before that he worked as a journalist at various publications including Business Day Wanted, BusinessLive, Forbes Africa and Thomson Reuters.
He holds a master of arts in aournalism from Stellenbosch University; a master of arts in philosophy, politics and economics from University of York; a bachelor of arts (Honours) in journalism and media studies. Tshepo is a Chevening Scholar and an EVA Junior Business Fellow.

03/18/2025

Our next speaker will explore the legal aspects of AI with the fellows. Welcome her.

Merisa Bowers earned her law degree cm laude from Case Western Reserve University School of Law and her bachelor of arts in political science with dpartmental honors from the University of Cincinnati.
In 2023, Merisa joined the Ohio Bar Liability Insurance Company (OBLIC) as Loss Prevention Counsel after nearly 14 years in private practice. In her role, she assists Ohio lawyers by advancing forward-thinking policies and managing risks with a blend of empathy and strategic planning.
Her thoughtful and strategic approach to advocacy has earned her recognition from her peers, including being named as a Top 40 Under 40 Attorney by the National LGBT Bar Association in 2016 and multiple Super Lawyers Rising Star designations.
She is an active member of the Ohio State Bar Association, the Columbus Bar Association, and a 2024 Ohio State Bar Foundation Fellow.
Bowers has provided guidance to her fellow bar members regarding the use of artificial intelligence in their work and in a new world that raises a number of questions about copyright, privacy and libel.

03/18/2025

An expert in AI imaging and fake spotting, our next speaker comes from Australia by way of Toronto.

Patrick Dell is an award-winning visual journalist who has worked in news for more than 25 years.
He was an editor and producer in Australian television before moving to Canada in 2006 and now works in the Visual Journalism team at The Globe and Mail.
Patrick’s current focus is reporting on dis- and misinformation, including generative AI and its impact on our information landscape.

03/16/2025

Welcome our next speaker to the 2025 Kiplinger Fellowship.

Samantha Sunne a freelance journalist based in New Orleans. She is the recipient of several national grants and awards for investigative reporting, most recently the ProPublica Local Reporting Network fellowship.
When not on a reporting project, she teaches at conferences, universities and newsrooms around the world, including Investigative Reporters & Editors (IRE), the Society of Professional Journalists (SPJ).
Her first book, coauthored with trainer Mike Reilley, “Data + Journalism: A Story-Driven Approach to Learning Data Reporting,” was an Amazon bestseller in 2023.

03/15/2025

Now, let's meet the 2025 Kiplinger Fellowship's lineup of impressive speakers.

This year's Kiplinger Fellowship in artificial intelligence in journalism brings some of the best trainers and minds on the subject to Ohio University. Our first speaker is widely known for his work with journalists in adapting AI and other technologies to their work.

Jeremy Caplan is Director of Teaching and Learning at CUNY's Newmark Graduate School of Journalism in New York City. Since 2010 he has led the school's Entrepreneurial Journalism Creators Program, a 100-day online-only curriculum for independent journalists around the world.
As a reporter at Time Magazine, Caplan wrote about digital innovation. After studying public policy at the Woodrow Wilson School at Princeton University, he earned an MS in Journalism as a Knight-Bagehot Fellow at Columbia University and an MBA at Columbia Business School as a Wiegers Fellow.
Before Caplan was an educator and journalist he was a violinist, serving as Concertmaster of the International Symphony Orchestra in Jerusalem.
He writes the Wonder Tools newsletter to help journalists and other professionals make the most of emerging technology, and he's online at jeremycaplan.com.
He lives in New York City with his wife and two young daughters in New York City, where they spend family time playing elaborate board games, jamming on their classical instruments, and making chocolate desserts.

03/14/2025

We have reached the end of our 2025 Kiplinger class introductions. Journalists will arrive in Columbus on March 22-23 to being their fellowship in AI and Journalism at Ohio University.

Our last introduced journalist comes to us from Sweden.

Carl Fridh Kleberg is an international corresponden for Swedish national television (SVT), covering Russia, Ukraine, the former USSR states, and the Middle East, as well as global conflicts and international affairs more broadly.
He has reported on world news for nearly 15 years, primarily based in Stockholm, with extended postings in Moscow and various countries across the Middle East.
In recent years, Carl has emerged as one of Sweden’s most prominently featured international correspondents. His coverage includes on-location reporting from the war in Ukraine from its first day, the October 7 attacks in Israel and the ensuing Gaza war, and the fall of the al-Assad regime in Syria.
Beyond news reporting, Carl has a strong background in digital source protection and IT security for journalists. He has conducted training and advocacy in this field, completed a short-term research fellowship at the London School of Economics, and co-authored a handbook for whistleblowers.
He has also served on the advisory board for Sweden’s premier Master’s Program in Investigative Journalism at Gothenburg University and on the editorial board of the magazine of Sweden’s Association of Investigative Journalists.

03/12/2025

Our next fellow is an educator, one of three in this year's class.

Mehrunnisa Wani is a photojournalist and an assistant professor of English.
She is a regular contributor to Forbes where she focuses on foreign policy, social justice, and resistance movements. Locally, she covers marginalized communities, exploring solidarity movements and activism around inclusion into American society, and rebuilding and reforming of identity.

03/11/2025

It’s getting closer.

The 2025 Kiplinger Fellowship is less than two weeks away and the back shop work is getting done in preparation for our 27 fellows. Can’t wait.

03/10/2025

Beginning our final week of Kiplinger Fellow introductions. Let's meet our fellow from Germany.

Kathrin Wesolowski is a freelance journalist and fact-checker, primarily working for the international broadcaster Deutsche Welle (DW).
She focuses on political and social topics. Kathrin conducts workshops worldwide on how to debunk disinformation and propaganda, as well as how to use social media and AI professionally. Additionally, she advocates for greater diversity in editorial teams.

03/07/2025

Our next fellow comes from Washington, D.C. and the Wall Street Journal. He carries on the Kiplinger tradition of Beltway journalists in the Kip Program. Welcome, Dustin.

Dustin Volz is a Washington-based cybersecurity and intelligence reporter for The Wall Street Journal. His coverage focuses on the national security and geopolitical dimensions of nation-state hacking conflict, digital espionage, online influence operations, election interference, and government surveillance.

Dustin has broken news of significant national and international impact, including stories involving Chinese and Russian cyber-espionage operations, U.S. surveillance programs, the Colonial Pipeline hack, corporate fraud, and the U.S. military's use of cyberweapons. He was part of the team at the Journal that revealed Trump had pressed Ukraine to investigate the Biden family, which led to his first impeachment.

Before joining the Journal in 2018, Dustin worked at Reuters and National Journal. His reporting has been internationally recognized, including by the White House Correspondents' Association, the Gerald Loeb Awards, the Society of Publishers in Asia, and the Robert F. Kennedy Center for Justice and Human Rights. He has appeared regularly on television and radio, including CBS This Morning, NPR’s All Things Considered, and a variety of C-SPAN programming.

In addition to Washington, Dustin has reported from London, Berlin and the Dominican Republic. He is a graduate of Arizona State University's Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication, where he was honored with an outstanding graduate award. Prior to starting his journalism career, Dustin spent a year living in Indonesia as a Fulbright teaching assistant.

He has remained active in other professional fellowships, including by serving on the alumni committee for the Fellowships at Auschwitz for the Study of Professional Ethics. In that role, Dustin has helped plan and facilitate two alumni trips to Oklahoma and Alabama for professionals to examine contemporary ethical issues through the lens of historical injustices.

Dustin lives in Washington, D.C., with his wife, Caitlin, and dog, Ever. For the past seven years, he has organized a monthly book club for journalists focused on issues important to the profession.

03/05/2025

We are pleased to have introduce one more member of the Kiplinger Fellowship.

Giovanny Joel Vega De Lleguas is a Puerto Rican journalist with over a decade of experience covering politics, government, sports, health, and medicine.
He has been recognized throughout his career for storytelling, earning national awards for multimedia journalism and feature writing. At the age of 23, he became the youngest editor in the country and, at 17, the youngest chronicler in the history of Puerto Rico's National Basketball League.
Currently, he leads the Innovation and Artificial Intelligence Unit at El Vocero de Puerto Rico, the leader in readership and distribution in Puerto Rico. In this role, he spearheads the integration of AI tools to transform editorial workflows and improve newsroom efficiency.
His work focuses on enhancing productivity, exploring multimedia content creation, and fostering the newsroom’s adaptation to emerging technologies.

03/05/2025

One more fellow for us to introduce in our 2025 class.

Aleksandra Stefanowicz is a dynamic and dedicated journalist with a passion for storytelling and uncovering the nuanced layers of social, political, and cultural issues.
From September 2023 she has been working as a producer at BBC News in Poland, where she played a pivotal role in bridging the gap between global audiences and the complexities of Polish society. Her work involved translating historical, social, and political contexts into compelling narratives that were both apolitical and objective.
During her tenure at BBC News, Aleksandra demonstrated a profound ability to analyze current events, their historical underpinnings, and societal implications. She produced in-depth reports on various topics, often venturing into the field to conduct interviews and gather firsthand insights. Her work frequently highlighted Poland’s cultural heritage and contemporary issues, ensuring international audiences gained a well-rounded understanding of the region.
Aleksandra’s experience at BBC News was enriched by her previous academic and professional pursuits. She studied journalism and communication during a transformative year in Brussels. Additionally, she volunteered with the Red Cross, organizing housing for refugees, which further solidified her commitment to addressing global challenges through storytelling.
Aleksandra is known for her collaborative spirit, valuing teamwork and diverse perspectives in the newsroom. She believes in the power of journalism to inform, inspire, and foster dialogue. Her time at BBC News affirmed her passion for presenting stories that resonate across cultural and geographical boundaries. Now, Aleksandra aims to continue her journey in journalism, leveraging her rich experience to create impactful narratives that contribute to a deeper understanding of the world.

03/03/2025

As we being to wrap up our introductions of this year's Kiplinger class, welcome our fellow from Poland and the BBC.

Aleksandra Stefanowicz is a dynamic and dedicated journalist with a passion for storytelling and uncovering the nuanced layers of social, political, and cultural issues.
From September 2023 she has been working as a producer at BBC News in Poland, where she played a pivotal role in bridging the gap between global audiences and the complexities of Polish society. Her work involved translating historical, social, and political contexts into compelling narratives that were both apolitical and objective.
During her tenure at BBC News, Aleksandra demonstrated a profound ability to analyze current events, their historical underpinnings, and societal implications. She produced in-depth reports on various topics, often venturing into the field to conduct interviews and gather firsthand insights. Her work frequently highlighted Poland’s cultural heritage and contemporary issues, ensuring international audiences gained a well-rounded understanding of the region.
Aleksandra’s experience at BBC News was enriched by her previous academic and professional pursuits.
She studied journalism and communication during a transformative year in Brussels. Additionally, she volunteered with the Red Cross, organizing housing for refugees, which further solidified her commitment to addressing global challenges through storytelling.
Aleksandra is known for her collaborative spirit, valuing teamwork and diverse perspectives in the newsroom. She believes in the power of journalism to inform, inspire, and foster dialogue. Her time at BBC News affirmed her passion for presenting stories that resonate across cultural and geographical boundaries. Now, Aleksandra aims to continue her journey in journalism, leveraging her rich experience to create impactful narratives that contribute to a deeper understanding of the world.

02/28/2025

Let us introduce you to our first ever fellow from Alaska, and we mean remote Alaska where NPR is a key source of news, in two languages.

Sage Smiley is news director for KYUK Public Media in Bethel, Alaska, serving more than 50 villages over thousands of miles with daily news in English and Yugtun, the Yup’ik language.

She’s worked with audio since she was a teenager at radio stations from Alaska to Amman and is passionate about sound-rich storytelling, rural radio and community-centered journalism. When not slinging a shotgun microphone around the Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta, she can likely be found in or around a body of water.

02/26/2025

Welcome to our next 2025 Kiplinger Fellows, a continuation of our streak of Mexican journalists to participate.

Roxana Romero is a Mexican journalist who began her career in 2014. She specializes in solutions journalism and investigative reporting. She writes about the environment, indigenous territorial defense, and human rights.
She currently works at Agence France-Presse as part of the U.S. fact-checking team, verifying false information circulating in Spanish.
Previously, she was an editor and mentor at the Border Center for Journalists and Bloggers (BCJB). Her work has been published in both national and international media outlets.
In 2019, she participated in the first Solutions Journalism workshop by the Gabo Foundation and later, as part of the Trainers Program, trained other journalists in Solutions Journalism in three Mexican states.
She is part of the seventh generation of the Latam Network of Young Journalists and the Network of Journalists of the Sea in Mexico; she is also a member of the CONNECTAS Hub and was a fellow of the International Women’s Media Foundation.

02/25/2025

Welcome another of our 2025 Kiplinger Fellows.

As an independent audio producer and freelance journalist, Thomas Reintjes covers stories at the intersection of science and society. Some of his long-form documentaries have won national and international awards. Topics range from the ethics of weaponized robots, to personal stories about scientists and their discoveries, to a fictionalized view of artificial intelligence.

His work has appeared on Deutschland Radio, WNYC and other radio stations, as well as in magazines such as MIT's Technology Review and Science Notes. The Goethe Institute and various global companies, institutions and podcast studios have commissioned podcast episodes and series from Thomas.

He also spends some of his spare time working on audio: He co-produced the German podcast Anfängerkrebs and the series Record of Change, which documented the impact of the pandemic on people around the world. He develops small software tools to help himself and others work more efficiently.

After participating in study tours to India, China and Russia, Thomas has co-organized fact-finding trips and taken groups of young journalists to Sweden, Norway, New York City and Switzerland. Thomas is a former board member of MIRP, the Meeting of Independent Radio Producers, and founded Tracks (https://trks.ac), a global community platform and knowledge base for radio and podcast producers.

He has been based in New York City since 2013. Previously, he co-owned a production company in Cologne, Germany, after graduating from Bonn-Rhein-Sieg University of Applied Sciences in 2004 with a Master's degree in technology journalism.

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