Alana Canady is a senior majoring in Film & Video Production. She was born and raised in Memphis, where she attended Middle College High School before transferring to Memphis Virtual School, where she graduated second in her class.
Ben Wheeler is an investigative reporter for the Daily Memphian. He previously served as an intern for the Institute for Public Service Reporting and has worked at the Yankton Daily Press and Dakotan in South Dakota and the Herald-Citizen in Cookeville, Tennessee.
Natasha Senjanovic is a contributor to The Institute for Public Service Reporting. A Nashville-based journalist and public radio producer, she’s won numerous awards as a news anchor and for reporting on vulnerable populations, including survivors of domestic and sexual violence, at-risk youth and undocumented immigrants. She served as afternoon host for Middle Tennessee NPR station WPLN for three years.
An intern at The Institute and a senior at the University of Memphis, Caleb is double-majoring in Broadcast Journalism and Film & Video Production. He’s worked with a variety of media outlets at the U of M, including WUMR 91.7 FM, The Daily Helmsman, and Tiger News, where he currently serves as executive producer. Caleb has won several awards, including the Lurene Kelly Video Story Award, a Hearst Television I – Features award, and various Tennessee AP Broadcasters & Media Editors awards.
Christopher Blank, The Institute’s Senior Producer, is News Director at WKNO-FM and a contributor to NPR. Before public radio, he worked for The Commercial Appeal, the St. Petersburg Times and was a special publications editor for Florida Trend magazine. In addition to numerous awards for reporting, he is an Annenberg-Getty Arts Journalism Fellow, a two-time NEA Arts Journalism Fellow, and a recipient of the Germantown Arts Alliance’s Arts and Humanities Medal. In his spare time, he produces the annual Tennessee Williams Tribute, a theater festival, in Columbus, Miss.
David Waters is Distinguished Journalist in Residence and assistant director of the Institute for Public Service Reporting at the University of Memphis.
