Category: Speakers

Charles Bramesco is a freelance film and TV critic living in Brooklyn.  A former staff writer for Rolling Stone, he has also been featured in the New York Times, New York Magazine, the Guardian, and many other fine publications. His first book, a volume on vampire movies for the “Close-Ups” series from Little White Lies, is now on US and UK shelves, and his to-be-announced second book will be published in early 2023. His favorite movie is Boogie Nights.

Arelis Hernández is a reporter covering the U.S. Southern border and immigration. She has covered hurricanes, mass shootings and the aftermath of Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico.  She was part of the team that created the digital project “Sin Luz: Life without power,” which garnered an national Emmy nomination and international recognition. She joined the Washington Post staff in 2014 to cover Prince George’s County, a suburb of Washington D.C., where she grew up. Hernández has also spent time in Venezuela for the foreign desk and at one point lived in Puerto Rico to probe the politics, culture and social movements of the island archipelago. Before The Post, she was recognized nationally for her coverage of the racial dynamics of Trayvon Martin’s shooting death and other coverage in Central Florida. She was part of the award-winning team that assembled the “George Floyd’s America” project which won several awards including a Peabody. That reporting led to the publishing of a book about Floyd’s life. She has a BA in broadcast journalism from the University of Maryland with a minor in U.S. Latinx studies.

Kendall Warner is a community photojournalist currently working for The News & Advance, a daily print newspaper, in Lynchburg, Va.  She was born and raised in Northern Virginia and studied at Western Kentucky University where she received a degree in photojournalism with a minor in political science. She has interned with Fairfax County Fire and Rescue’s Public Information Officers, with The Victoria Advocate in Victoria, Texas and with MLive Media Group in Kalamazoo, Mich. Kendall also freelances for The Associated Press which has led to photos being used by The Washington Post, New York Times, ESPN, The Guardian and other publications around the country.

Donna L. Harris brings 24 years of communications and public affairs experience to the District of Columbia’s Department of General Services (DGS).  As the agency’s Public Information Officer, she serves as the point of contact for media representatives regarding the work of the agency and its people. In this capacity, Ms. Harris provides strategic communications by ensuring key information about the nature and impact of DGS activities is accessible, reliable, and delivered through multiple channels to agency constituents. She works with agency senior leadership to develop strategies and protocols to support specific internal and external communications goals. Donna developed the agency’s crisis communications plan and serves as the agency representative when the District’s Joint Information Center is activated for major citywide events and incidents.

Prior to joining DGS in 2017, Ms. Harris served on the ABC7 News (WJLA) news team in Washington, D.C. from 2012 to 2016 where she provided daily logistics and field production in a fast-paced news environment. She is the recipient of three National Capital Chesapeake Bay Regional Emmy Awards and an Edward R. Murrow Award – all focused on team coverage – while at WJLA. From 2008 to 2010 she was a news director at WVVI (93.5FM) in the U.S. Virgin Islands and reported live from Capitol Hill on the inauguration of President Barack Obama. From 1998 to 2010 she worked at ABC13 News (WSET) in Lynchburg, Virginia where she was a news anchor, reporter, and producer. Before her second career in news and public affairs, Ms. Harris served 12 years in the Executive Office at the National Association of College and University Business Officers (NACUBO).

Donna is a native Washingtonian, was educated at the University of the District of Columbia in Journalism and was recruited by WUSA9 to begin her career in television news. She is active with the Public Relations Society of America and in her spare time enjoys mentoring others and exuberant runs with her Weimaraner.

Doni Holloway is an award-winning multimedia journalist with an affinity for telling meaningful and impactful stories.  His interest in journalism began when he was six. At that age, he fell in love with and realized the power of words. He’s a speaker, producer and frequent host.

The Laurinburg, NC native has won over 25 national, state and local awards for his journalistic and leadership endeavors. He has been featured in U.S. News & World Report, Electronic Urban Report, Talking Biz News, the National Association of Black Journalists Journal and numerous other publications.

He has served as an ambassador for the Disney Dreamers Academy with Steve Harvey & ESSENCE Magazine (DDA), returning to the program as an alumnus and guest speaker, entertainment host and mentor. He’s also an alumni board member of the Asian American Journalists Association (AAJA) JCamp.

Holloway has reported around the country, studied media markets on the ground in China, and has spoken at a myriad of venues, including the National Press Club, where he auditioned and was selected to introduce NBC TODAY show anchor Hoda Kotb, WJMC’s keynote speaker in 2014. He’s a frequent moderator of events and graduated from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill with a degree in broadcast journalism, where he was named as the National Association of Black Journalists Student Journalist of the Year. Holloway is now producer of NBC/MSNBC’s #1 original “Why Is This Happening?” podcast with Chris Hayes. He previously worked at Bloomberg News in NYC, where he created content for television, radio, podcasts and grew the Bloomberg Businessweek podcast to be the company’s highest grossing one.

Before working at Bloomberg, he was an Emma Bowen fellow in the NBC Washington network newsroom from 2015-2017.

Kevin Douglas Grant is The GroundTruth Project’s Co-founder and Chief Content Officer, as well as Vice President, Strategic Initiatives of Report for America and Report for the World.

Previously Senior Editor of Special Reports at GlobalPost, he has led reporting projects around the world and his work has been recognized by the Edward R. Murrow, Alfred I. duPont-Columbia University and Online Journalism Awards among others.  Over the last 10 years, he has helped to support more than 300 reporting fellows producing in-depth work on social justice issues in more than 50 countries.

Grant is a recent graduate of the Media Transformation Challenge at Poynter, and is presently working on a project about religious leaders worldwide as a journalism fellow at USC Center for Religion and Civic Culture.

He holds an M.A. in Digital Journalism from the University of Southern California’s Annenberg School, where he was a Dean’s Scholar and the founding Executive Editor of Annenberg’s pioneering news organization Neon Tommy. Grant is also the former Operations Director of semantic news aggregator Inform.com.

Grant is currently based in Washington, D.C., where he serves as a capstone adviser and adjunct professor of journalism at Georgetown University.

After attending WJMC in the summer of 2017, Collin Cope gained a newfound appreciation for the art of journalism and media production. Meeting many new friends, and even a few future colleagues, Collin’s time with WJMC encouraged him to attend George Mason for his Bachelor of Arts in Communication. With experience writing and editing for George Mason’s student-run newspaper, as well as freelancing for local outlet The Fairfax County Times, Collin emphasizes the importance of varied experience and a general sense of curiosity when reporting.