News Release

Dvorkin will discuss "Journalism in the 21st Century: Will We Ever Be High-Minded Again?"

As the senior news manager at NPR, Dvorkin is responsible for all news programming, manages the NPR news staff and budget and strengthens relationships with member stations. He joined NPR after 21 years at the Canadian Broadcast Corporation, where he rose to chief journalist and managing editor of CBC Radio News. Previously, he reported, wrote, edited and produced for CBC from London, Montreal, Ottawa and Toronto. In 1989, he reported from Prague and Budapest on the fall of communism in Eastern Europe. He has spoken on freedom of speech issues and been a consultant on public broadcasting for journalists in Slovenia, Hungary and Poland.

The Frank R. Kent Memorial Lecture honors the late Baltimore journalist, who served as a Baltimore Sun correspondent in the 1920s and as its managing editor for 10 years. He is perhaps best remembered as one of the country's first daily political columnists and was renowned for his witty and insightful commentary on national political issues. His syndicated column appeared in more than 100 newspapers across the country. Kent retired in 1947 and died in 1958.

In 1965, New York Times journalist James Reston delivered the first Kent lecture, which has sought to bring to Johns Hopkins the country's most respected journalists. Some recent speakers have been Frank Rich, New York Times columnist; Ben Bradlee, former Washington Post editor-in-chief; Marvin Kalb, Edward R. Murrow Professor of Press and Public Policy at Harvard University; David Halberstam, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and author; and, most recently, New Yorker European correspondent Jane Kramer.

Admission to the Frank L. Kent Memorial Lecture is free and open to the public, but tickets are required. Call 410-516-7157.

The media sponsor for this lecture is public radio station WJHU-FM, 88.1, which is a service of The Johns Hopkins University.