MUSCATINE, Iowa – The Stanley Center for Peace and Security has partnered with the World Press Institute (WPI) to host a World Press Perspectives forum here on Tuesday, March 21.
Zachary Oren Smith, of Iowa Public Radio, will moderate a conversation with 10 professional journalists from around the globe who make up this year’s WPI Fellows cohort. Each year, WPI selects Fellows to tour the United States and gain access to its premier media outlets, think tanks, advocacy organizations, policymakers and everyday people.
The Muscatine forum, part of the group’s U.S. tour, will be from 6:30-8 p.m. at The Merrill Hotel, 119 W. Mississippi Drive.
Due to the Stanley Center’s long-held belief that independent journalism is a critical part of strong global governance, WPI looked to the Muscatine-based not-for-profit to host the world press perspectives forum. Attendees will have the opportunity to listen to the diverse experiences of the WPI Fellows to help broaden their understanding of the world and make connections to how world events have an impact locally.
Journalists in the 2023 WPI Fellows cohort are from Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Bulgaria, Finland, France, Nigeria, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Turkey. They will share a wide variety of viewpoints that they bring to their journalistic work, and discuss how that connects to journalism in Iowa. They will spend nine weeks in the U.S. examining the free press and media innovations and learning about America’s social and cultural diversity as well as its political system.
The 58th fellows program began March 3 in Minneapolis/St. Paul, where they are spending three weeks based at the University of St. Thomas in St. Paul. The fellows will travel the U.S. for five weeks and the tour ends May 6.They also will stop in several major metropolitan areas including New York City, Washington, D.C., Miami, Austin (Texas), Chicago, San Francisco and Los Angeles before returning to Minnesota for the final week.
Next week, the journalists will visit Iowa farm country with stops in the Amanas, meetings with various agricultural organizations and then to Muscatine. There, they will tour the Stanley Center of Peace and Security’s new downtown headquarters, which will be the first Living Building Challenge project in the state.
Registration is required for the World Press Perspectives, which is free and open to the public. To register, visit here.
According to its website, WPI was established in 1961 to strengthen and promote the founding principles and best practices of journalism in the United States and around the world that lead to transparency and accountability of the government and private sectors. Based in Minnesota’s Twin Cities, WPI is a private nonprofit organization supported by a diverse group of foundations, local and national media, multinational corporations, and individuals.
For more information about the Stanley Center for Peace and Security and the organization’s commitment to independent journalism, visit its website.
