Women's eNews Biographies

Staff

RITA HENLEY JENSEN
is Founder and Editor in Chief of Women's eNews (www.womensenews.org), an independent daily news service covering issues of particular concern to women, which has won 26 journalism awards, including the PASS Award from the National Council on Crime and Delinquency and the Rosa Cisneros award from the International Planned Parenthood Federation, Western Hemisphere Region. Jensen also was named by the New York Daily News one of the 100 most influential women in New York. A former senior writer for the National Law Journal and columnist for The New York Times Syndicate, Jensen has more than 20 years of experience in journalism and journalism education, as well as an armload of awards, including the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism Alumni award, the Hunter College Presidential Grant for Innovative Uses of Technology in Teaching, the Alicia Patterson fellowship, and the Lloyd P. Burns Public Service prize. Jensen is also a survivor of domestic violence and a former welfare mother who earned degrees from Ohio State University and Columbia Graduate School of Journalism. She is also the grandmother of four, two granddaughters and two grandsons.

CORINNA BARNARD
is Women's eNews' Senior Editor, a writer whose journalism background spans coverage of finance, arms control, medicine, technology and parenting issues. In her most recent full-time position she worked for Dow Jones, Inc., where for many years she served as news editor for an international newswire covering emerging markets and later as a copy editor for The Wall Street Journal. Earlier in her career, Corinna was a radio commentator for "In The Public Interest," a national public-affairs radio program. She graduated from Yale University in 1980 with a degree in English literature.

ARIEL JENSEN-VARGAS
is Women's eNews' Web Operations Manager. Jensen-Vargas worked for seven years as a computer graphic artist after graduating magna cum laude from Hunter College, specializing in Women's Studies, public policy, and computer programming. She is responsible for Web site maintenance, including uploading content, preparing art, and updating Web pages. She designs logos and printed pieces and organizes special projects, such as the 21 Leaders for the 21st Century. Jensen-Vargas is the mother of two children and an active breastfeeding advocate.

JENNIFER THURSTON
is Women's eNews' Associate Editor and has extensively covered politics, culture, arts, environmental policy and federal agencies in her home state of Colorado. She is former news director of Telluride's radio station, KOTO-FM, and wrote for the former Telluride Times-Journal and the Telluride Daily Planet, where she was called Lois on occasion. She holds degrees from the University of North Carolina at Asheville and Columbia University. Thus far, she has managed to be a woman her entire life.

ALLISON STEVENS graduated with a master’s degree in reporting and writing from Northwestern University's School of Journalism and spent five years covering Congress, first for The Hill newspaper and then for Congressional Quarterly. She is now Washington Bureau Chief for Women's eNews. Prior to her graduate work, Allison taught English in Japan and Ecuador for two years and traveled throughout Asia, South America and Europe. Allison attended the University of Michigan and graduated cum laude with a bachelor's degree in English literature and a concentration in Spanish.

SANDRA SPADY
became the Senior Development Associate in October of 2005, but currently holds the Women's eNews' record for titles. She also answers to Marketing Assistant, Board Liaison, Technology Liaison and Budget Gatekeeper. She credits her hat-wearing ability to her previous five years' experience in the nonprofit world and three in public relations. She has a B.A. in English from University of Virginia, a master's in media management from Virginia Commonwealth University and a degree in urban education from New York City School of Hard Knocks. You can learn more about her double life as a musician at http://www.sspady.com.

ROBYN ROSSNAGEL
oversees Member Services and joined Women's eNews in November 1999 as assistant editor. Rossnagel received her masters in sport and recreation science from Temple University. A single mother, she enjoys traveling, cooking, reading, history and keeping fit--when time allows--with biking, walking and occasionally roller blading.

Correspondents

Suzanne Batchelor's health and science articles have also appeared in Ms. magazine, online at Medscape, CBS Healthwatch and WebMD, and on the radio series "Earth and Sky." She reports from Texas.

Kristin Bender writes about politics, criminal justice issues, environmental policy, health and a wide variety of quirky and imaginative people for the Oakland Tribune, where she has been on staff for six years. Kristin holds a degree in journalism from San Francisco State University and has spent the last 15 years writing for daily newspapers in the San Francisco Bay Area. She has written about health, the sex industry, childbearing issues and alternative fuel for Women's eNews since 2004.

Women's Studies pioneer and WeNews Historian Louise Bernikow holds degrees from Columbia and Oxford universities. In the 1960s, she went from being a Fulbright scholar in Spain to covering ladies' teas for the London Times to taking part in the action and passion of the times at home. She is the author of seven acclaimed books and many magazine articles. Her books "Among Women" and "The World Split Open" became feminist classics, along with the irreverent "The American Women's Almanac," published in 1997. "Bark If You Love Me" hit the best-seller list in the new millennium. Bernikow was a founder of the Columbia Seminar on Women and Society and the Women's Biography Group at CUNY, and her program, "The Shoulders We Stand On," emphasizes reaching across generations to unearth women's activist history and inspire audiences to take up the challenge.

Theresa Braine moved to Mexico from New York in 2001 to pursue her long-held dream of being a foreign correspondent. Today she covers breaking news, health, business, celebrities and travel in addition to women’s issues and has written for People magazine, the Associated Press and other media. She holds a master’s degree in journalism from Columbia University.

Cindy Cooper is an independent journalist in New York City. With a background as a lawyer, she writes frequently about justice issues. Her articles have appeared in Ms., the National Law Journal, Marie Claire, New York Law Journal, Glamour, The Nation, In These Times, American Bar Association Journal, Equal Justice Magazine, CorpWatch, TomPaine.com, Perspectives, Mamm, Poz, Canadian Women's Studies, California Lawyer, Talk2Action.com and elsewhere. She is the author of five books, including "Mockery of Justice," and a contributor to several others. She is also an award-winning playwright, with works included in 11 publications and produced at venues across the country. More information at http://www.cyncooperwriter.net.

Rachel Corbett is a freelance writer based in New York. She writes about gender, race and class in pop culture, reproductive health, body politics, feminism in education and activism. Rachel began at Women's eNews as an intern in the summer of 2005 and and is currently at The Nation. She studied women's studies and psychology at the University of Iowa and plans to attend graduate school in the fall.

Jeff Fleischer A Chicago area native, Jeff Fleischer has worked as an editorial fellow at Mother Jones in San Francisco, as a reporter in residence at the Sydney Morning Herald in Australia, and as the national politics and op/ed editor for U-Wire. He currently writes for publications including Chicago magazine, Mother Jones, Mental Floss, The New Republic, World Jewish Digest, the Chicago Daily Herald, Chicago Wilderness, Crain's Chicago Business and Chicagoland Tails.

Jennifer Friedlin is a freelance reporter based in Brooklyn, New York. She has lived and worked as a reporter in Israel and Bosnia and has also reported from Macedonia, Croatia, Jordan, Kenya and various countries in Western Europe. She has worked as a staff reporter for The Jerusalem Post, Reuters and The Associated Press and her freelance work has appeared in The New York Times, Marie Claire, Glamour, The New York Daily News, The Financial Times and The Guardian among other publications.

Sheila Gibbons produces a monthly column on gender and media for Women's eNews. A longtime observer of the interplay of media and social roles, she is also editor of the quarterly news journal Media Report to Women and co-author of the award-winning textbook, Taking Their Place: A Documentary History of Women and Journalism. (Strata Publishing). A former university journalism instructor and women's magazine editor, Sheila spent 11 years at Gannett Co., Inc., first as an editor and then as the company's director of public affairs. Today she is a partner in a consulting firm, Communication Research Associates, Inc. She holds a political science degree from the State University of New York at Albany and a master's in journalism from the University of Maryland.

Molly M. Ginty is a freelance reporter based in New York City. A graduate of Columbia University's Graduate School of Journalism, she has written for Ms., Marie Claire, Good Housekeeping, Redbook, Ladies' Home Journal, pbs.org and On Earth as well as Women's eNews.

Sandra Guy is a 22-year veteran journalist, is a business reporter at the Chicago Sun-Times. She has covered business, politics, education, technology and peace issues, and served as a former president of the Chicago chapter of the Association for Women Journalists.

Nicole Itano is a freelance journalist currently based in Athens, Greece, where she focuses on political and cultural issues in the Balkans and Eastern Mediterranean. She spent five years reporting from around the African continent for the Christian Science Monitor and other publications. Her first book, “No Place Left to Bury the Dead: Denial, Despair and Hope in the African AIDS Pandemic” about the lives of four women grappling with the AIDS, will be published in November 2007 by Atria Books. She is a graduate of Yale University.

Anna Koblanck moved to Johannesburg, South Africa, in August 2004 as the Africa correspondent for the Swedish daily newspaper Dagens Nyheter. She also works as a freelance writer for a number of other publications, mainly Swedish. In 2003 she spent three months with an HIV-positive woman in Botswana to write a book, "A Few Days More." Koblanck's account of the life of Patience Botshelo was first published in Swedish in April 2004. The book has been translated into English and will be distributed for free at testing centers and AIDS clinics in southern Africa during the first half of 2006, courtesy of the Swedish aid agency Sida. Before Koblanck took up work in Africa, she was covering international economics for Dagens Nyheter from Stockholm.

Laura Koss-Feder is a business and features writer who has contributed to major publications such as Time, The New York Times, Money, Business Week, Investors Business Daily, Newsday and MSNBC.com. She holds a bachelor's degree in journalism from Northwestern University.

Nancy Cook Lauer is the Hawaii Capitol reporter for Stephens Media Group, whose newspapers include West Hawaii Today, the Hawaii Tribune-Herald and the Las Vegas Review-Journal. She is second vice president of the Association of Capitol Reporters and Editors (CapitolBeat), belongs to Investigative Reporters and Editors and is an active contributor to the IRE, NICAR and Newslib listservs. As Capitol bureau chief at the Tallahassee Democrat, she won a first-place award for beat reporting in her circulation category from CapitolBeat. She holds a bachelor's degree, summa cum laude, in psychology from Old Dominion University, and a master's degree in library and information sciences from Florida State University.

Michael Luongo is a New York City-based travel writer, editor and photographer. He graduated with a degree in communications from Rutgers University, and went back for a master's in urban planning. His work has appeared in The New York Times, Business Traveler, The Chicago Tribune, Bloomberg News, Town & Country Travel, Out Traveler, Conde Nast Traveler, National Geographic Traveler and many others. He is the author of the Frommer's Buenos Aires first edition, and co-edited Continuum Press's 2002 "Gay Tourism: Culture, Identity and Sex." He prefers off-the-beaten-path destinations, but it is in war-torn and recovering countries that he finds some of the most compelling projects for local women. His Web site http://www.michaelluongo.com has links to articles and photographs from his travels.

Courtney E. Martin writes about the big three--gender, race and class--with a bit of pop culture and book review thrown in for good measure. She is currently working on a nonfiction book, blending personal essay and cultural critique, on her generation's obsession with food and fitness. It is scheduled for publication in January 2007 on Simon and Schuster's Free Press (working title: Perfect Girls, Starving Daughters). Courtney is also an adjunct professor of women's studies at Hunter College and holds an M.A. from NYU's Gallatin School and a B.A. from Barnard College. Read more about her work at www.courtneyemartin.com.

Elizabeth Mehren is a national correspondent for the Los Angeles Times, based in Boston. She has covered every presidential election since 1980. She also has covered such major national stories as the Challenger explosion, the terrorist attacks of 9-11 and Hurricane Katrina. Mehren has written for numerous national magazines and is the author of three books.

Aunohita Mojumdar is an Indian journalist who has been reporting from the South Asian region for 16 years. Reporting extensively on political and social issues, she has also specialized in reporting on areas of conflict including Kashmir, Punjab and Nepal. Most recently she traveled to Afghanistan in 2003 to work with nongovernmental organizations building local Afghan media agencies after three decades of conflict. Whilst there, she launched the first regular bulletin on the working conditions and rights of Afghan journalists. The publication is now brought out by her Afghan colleagues and Aunohita has returned to news reporting, her primary vocation.

Haroon Mirani is a freelance journalist reporting from the conflict zone of Indian-administered Kashmir. For the last five years he has covered Kashmir extensively for local, national and international media. He holds a master's in mass communication and journalism from the University of Kashmir. He has also done research on the health sector in a conflict zone under the Panos South Asia fellowship 2006-07. He also is recipient of the CRY (Child Rights and You) Fellowship 2007 to work on "Half Orphans of Kashmir."

Sheryl Nance-Nash is a freelance writer based in Long Beach, New York. She specializes in personal finance, small business and general business. She began her career in legal journalism at the National Law Journal, and moved on to the New York Law Journal and California Law Business before venturing into financial journalism. In the early 1990s she worked as a reporter for Money magazine and later as a staff writer at Your Company magazine (now called FSB). A freelancer for the last several years, her work has appeared in publications such as Black Enterprise, Essence, Crain's New York Business, Newsday and the New York Daily News, among others.

Before becoming Justine Nicholas, she was an altar boy and boy scout. Then she went to college and listened to lots of old white men talk about dead white men. After that, she worked in public relations, began to teach, and wrote about sports, crime and other things that taught her a lot she doesn't use today. Since becoming Justine, she's begun a novel, written some new poetry and has been writing about gender, arts, education, workplace and health issues. She also teaches at York College. "I'm a woman now," Justine says, "and I ain't goin' back."

Clara Park is a freelance journalist and a communication and change management consultant based in Rome. She writes on world news, gender, human rights and development issues for a number of Italian publications, while also being a staff writer for the Italian women’s news agency Delt@ News. Second generation Korean, Clara was born and grew up in Italy, but also lived in the U.S. and Korea and travelled extensively in Europe. She holds a bachelor's degree, cum laude, in communications from the University of Michigan, and a master's degree in communications management from the Annenberg School of Communications of the University of Southern California.

Anju Mary Paul, a freelance cultural reporter based in New York, graduated from New York University in 2005 with a master's degree in journalism. She previously lived in India, Scotland, Saudi Arabia and Singapore where she graduated from the National University of Singapore with a first class honors degree in business administration. She writes primarily about women and children, especially immigrants, while also serving as travel editor at In The Fray, an online independent magazine dealing with issues of identity and community.

Kavitha Rao is a freelance writer who has lived and worked in Mumbai, Hong Kong, Bangkok and Tokyo. She currently lives in London, and writes on literature, education, women's issues, current affairs, travel and lifestyle. Her features have appeared in the South China Morning Post, Womens eNews, the Daily Telegraph, the Far Eastern Economic Review and Asiaweek, among others. She can be contacted through her website on www.kavitharao.net.

Angeli Rasbury is a freelance reporter based in Brooklyn, N.Y. She writes about a wide range of women's and girls' issues. She works with young people and is a lawyer, community activist and photographer. Her freelance work has also appeared in Essence, The Source, American Legacy, Black Issues Book Review and other magazines. Angeli graduated from Syracuse University and Temple University School of Law.

Caryl Rivers is an award-winning journalist, novelist and media critic, and is also a professor of journalism at Boston University. A former Washington correspondent, she has covered American life and politics for more than three decades. She is the author of 12 books, which have been selections of the Literary Guild, Book of the Month Club and Doubleday Book Club. She received the "Yankee Quill" award from the Society of Professional Journalists for distinguished achievement, and her articles have appeared in The New York Times, Rolling Stone, The Nation, Ms., Saturday Review, Mother Jones, Dissent, the Los Angeles Times, Boston Globe, Chicago Tribune and others. Rivers is also a member of the also a member of the Women's eNews Board of Directors.

Jen Ross is a freelance reporter based in Chile. She previously worked as a researcher and television producer for the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation's parliamentary bureau in Ottawa. In 2003, she decided to return to her mother's homeland (Chile) to work as a freelance foreign correspondent, writing about issues that moved her. Her regular radio strings include CBC radio and television, BBC radio, Spanish National Radio (RNE), and NPR's Latino USA. She has also published widely in newspapers and magazines around the world. She speaks five languages and holds a bachelor's degree in journalism from Carleton University, in Canada, a master's degree in political studies from Queen's University, and a master's in international relations from the London School of Economics, in England. Her Web site is http://jen-ross.tripod.com/portfolio.htm.

Shadi Sadr, editor in chief of WomenInIran (a daily website about Iranian women's news and issues), based on Iran. She received master degree of International Law from Tehran University in 1998. She has worked as a journalist since she was fifteen. She won two times the first prize of Iran Press Festival for her articles and columns in newspapers. She received Ida B. Wells award for bravery in journalism from women's enews in 2004. She is a lawyer, too and lives with her daughter and husband in Tehran.

Meghan Sapp is Women's eNews' EU correspondent, based in Brussels, Belgium. A former journalist for Dow Jones and the Wall Street Journal, her writing has appeared on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean in dozens of magazines and newspapers. She travels across the European Union covering agriculture, trade and development as well as where the three areas collide. Meghan is a California native but has traded the sun and sand for the multilingual and multicultural lifestyle of "the Old World" though she has yet to trade her passport.

Hannah Seligson is a freelance reporter based in New York. She writes about a wide range of women's issues, focusing primarily on those that affect younger women. She is currently working on a nonfiction book, "New Girl on the Job," a guide for young women starting out in the workplace. It is scheduled for publication in the spring of 2007 by Citadel Press. Her freelance work has also appeared in the Village Voice and the New York Daily News. Hannah graduated from Brown University in 2004 with a degree in political science.

Yigal Schleifer is a freelance journalist based in Istanbul, Turkey, where he works as a correspondent for the Christian Science Monitor and the Jerusalem Report. His work has also appeared in the Washington Post, Toronto Star, Village Voice, Atlanta Journal Constitution and other publications. A graduate of New York University's master's program in journalism and Near Eastern studies, Yigal has worked throughout the Middle East and the Caucasus, covering a wide range of stories, from politics and security issues to religion and culture.

Jerome Socolovsky reports from Madrid for NPR’s Morning Edition and All Things Considered. A graduate of the University of Pennsylvania’s School of Engineering, he switched careers and has been a foreign correspondent since 1989. He also has graduate degrees from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government. He speaks seven languages, and works from home, where he raises two children with his wife, Petra, a correspondent for Swedish Radio.

Bojana Stoparic reports on international development and human rights stories from New York City. She gained first-hand experience with these issues by working with women’s rights organizations in the U.S. and Croatia. After graduating from Bryn Mawr College with a bachelor’s degree in cultural studies and a concentration in feminist and gender studies, she studied journalism at New York University and received her master’s in cultural reporting and criticism. Bojana was also an intern at The Nation in 2001.

Ann Telnaes is a freelance editorial cartoonist living in Washington, D.C. She is the 2001 recipient of the Pulitzer Prize for editorial cartooning, one of only four cartoonists in the history of the Pulitzers not affiliated with a newspaper. Ann's editorial cartoons have appeared in the Washington Post, Chicago Tribune, The New York Times, Los Angeles Times, the Detroit News and hundreds of other national newspapers. Her television appearances have included C-SPAN, The Editors (Canada), The Lehrer Newshour, and on BBC radio. The Library of Congress will exhibit a collection of her work in late 2003.

Juliette Terzieff is a freelance journalist currently based in Buffalo, N.Y. After receiving a bachelor's degree in political science from Niagara University, she served as a Peace Corps volunteer in the Central Asian republic of Turkmenistan before beginning her journalism career. Specializing in crisis zones, Ms. Terzieff has covered events in Serbia, Kosovo, Bulgaria, Turkey, Pakistan, India and Afghanistan for clients including Newsweek, the San Francisco Chronicle, CNN International and the London Sunday Times.

Rebecca Vesely writes on health for The Oakland Tribune. She was a founding editor at Business 2.0 magazine, and is former Washington bureau chief for Wired News. From 1999 to 2001 she was editorial director at ChickClick.com, a progressive Web site for young women with 1.2 million members. While there, she launched the first nationally syndicated radio program for teen girls. She has also served as editorial consultant to Choice USA, a pro-choice group founded by Gloria Steinem. She has a master's degree in journalism from Northwestern University, and her articles have been published in Mother Jones, Salon, Wired, Seattle Weekly and Details.

Laura J. Winter is originally from Sierra Madre, Calif., and, after years of living out of bag, has recently moved to London. She writes for the Christian Science Monitor and the New York Daily News and has been filing stories from Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan for four years.