2021 Summer Institute for Educators

Kristen Schorsch

WBEZ Chicago Reporter

Kristen Schorsch is a reporter on WBEZ’s government and politics team, where she covers Cook County and public health. Previously, she covered health care, government, crime, courts, higher education and news of the weird (think coffin parties) for Crain’s Chicago Business, the Chicago Tribune, the Daily Southtown and the Iowa City Press-Citizen. Kristen has won more than a dozen local and national awards for her work. Her stories have sparked policy changes and spurred investigations.

María Inés Zamudio

WBEZ Chicago Reporter

Maria Ines Zamudio covers immigration for WBEZ. She is an award-winning investigative reporter who is now part of the race, class and communities team. Prior to joining WBEZ, she worked for American Public Media’s investigative team. She’s also worked as an investigative reporter for the Memphis Commercial Appeal and Chicago Reporter magazine.

Mariah Woelfel

WBEZ Chicago Reporter

Mariah Woelfel covers city government at WBEZ. Before joining the City Hall beat in 2021, Mariah worked as a general assignment reporter and producer at the station, where she covered the creation of and start to Illinois’ multimillion dollar recreational cannabis industry, as well as the city and state’s healthcare systems during the COVID-19 pandemic. Prior to WBEZ, Mariah worked as a reporter, producer and All Things Considered host at WVIK, an NPR member station in western Illinois.

Jaya Mukherjee

Education Coordinator, Pulitzer Center

Jaya Mukherjee is a Chicago-based coordinator for the education team at the Pulitzer Center. In her previous job, she managed creative writing programs for Chicago Public School students, focusing on short-form memoir and novel-length fiction. She has worked in education for ten years, beginning her career as a special education teacher in Compton, California. Jaya holds a BFA in Dramatic Writing from New York University, a M.Phil from Trinity College Dublin in Film Theory, and a MA in Special Education from Loyola Marymount University.

Ziyah Gafic

Freelance Photojournalist

Ziyah Gafic is an award-winning photojournalist and videographer based in Sarajevo, focusing on societies locked in a perpetual cycle of violence and Muslim communities around the world. He covered major stories in over 50 countries. Gafic’s work received many prestigious awards, such as multiple honors at World Press Photo, Grand Prix Discovery of the Year at Les Rencontres d’Arles, a Hasselblad Masters Award, the City of Perpignan Award for Young Reporters at Visa pour l’Image, Photo District News, the Getty Images grant for editorial photography, TED fellowship, Prince Claus grant, and the Magnum Emergency fund grant. His work is regularly published in leading international publications. Gafic authored several monographs, including Troubled Islam – short stories from troubled societies, Quest for Identity, and the most recent, Heartland.

Nick Schifrin

PBS Newshour Special Correspondent

Nick Schifrin is PBS NewsHour‘s foreign affairs and defense correspondent. He leads NewsHour‘s foreign reporting and has created week-long, in-depth series for NewsHour from China, Russia, Ukraine, Nigeria, Egypt, Kenya, Cuba, Mexico, and the Baltics. The series “Inside Putin’s Russia” won a 2018 Peabody Award. Prior to PBS, Schifrin was Al Jazeera America‘s Middle East correspondent. Before that, he was a correspondent for ABC News, based in Afghanistan and Pakistan for four years.

Abir Kopty

Journalist & Writer

Abir Kopty, a Palestinian journalist and writer based in Berlin, is the senior editor and host of Almostajad. She holds an MA in Political Communication from City University, London, and is a PhD candidate at the Institute for Media and Communication Studies, Freie Universität Berlin. She contributes political analysis to media outlets such as Middle East Eye and TRT, and hosted in 2018 “Eib”, an audio podcast about motherhood and parenting produced by Sowt Podcasting.

Lama Rabah

Podcaster, Editor & Journalist

Lama Rabah, a podcaster, editor and journalist based in Palestine, is currently a full-time podcast producer at Thmanyah, a Saudi-based publishing platform. Lama holds an MA in multimedia journalism from the University of Oregon, and a BA in radio and TV broadcast from Birzeit University. She previously worked as a senior producer at Sowt Podcasts, and co-hosted the monthly podcast and live show “Radio No Frequency”. Her main interest is experimenting with audio storytelling, political satire, and performance.