KEYNOTE SPEAKER - RAY SUAREZ
Journalist Ray Suarez, former host of National Public Radio’s Talk of the Nation, has recently joined respected journalist, Jim Lehrer, on The Newshour with Jim Lehrer. Suarez joined NPR in 1993, after more than seven years as a reporter with NBC station WMAQ-TV in Chicago. Widely recognized in the national press as a groundbreaking talk program, Talk of the Nation, won the prestigious Columbia University Silver Baton Award as part of NPR’s coverage of South African elections, after Suarez hosted the program from Johannesburg during South Africa’s first all-race elections. When peace came to Northern Ireland after a quarter century of "the troubles," Suarez made Talk of the Nation the first news program to broadcast live to the United Kingdom, the Republic of Ireland, and the United States, presenting a series of unprecedented interviews from all sides in the simmering Ulster conflict.
Suarez’s book on white flight and the American city, The Old Neighborhood: What We Lost in the Great Suburban Migration, was published in 1999, and in 1998, his writing was included in an anthology called Las Christmas: Favorite Latino Authors Share Their Holiday Memories. Over the years, his essays and criticism have been published in The Washington Post, The New York Times, The Chicago Tribune, The Baltimore Sun, and many other publications.
Suarez brings more than twenty years experience to the news business. While at WMAQ, he covered local, national and international stories, including a series of profiles examining life under Cuban leader Fidel Castro and a documentary, The New Hispanic Politics: From the Barrios to the Hall. Before going to Chicago, Suarez was a Los Angeles Correspondent for CNN, a producer for the ABC Radio Network in New York, a reporter for CBS Radio in Rome, and a reporter for various American and British news services in London. He covered stories from the attempted assassination of Pope John Paul II and the 1980’s drought in sub-Saharan Africa to the release of 52 American hostages from Iran and the royal wedding of Lady Diana Spencer to Prince Charles. In 1997, Suarez was a co-host of the PBS series on money and politics, Follow the Money, and a correspondent for the PBS quarterly newsmagazine, State of the Union.
Hispanic Magazine called Suarez "One of the 25 Most Important Latinos in Washington" in 1998 and The Los Angeles Times named Suarez one of its "100 People to Watch in 1996." Utne Reader named him one of its "Visionaries," and Hispanic Business called him one of the "100 Influentials" among American Latinos.
Suarez wrote the forward and first chapter for Hillary Clinton’s new book entitled, Saving America’s Treasures: Our Imperiled Heritage, due out in October 2000. He also wrote the forward for Local Heroes Changing America due out in September 2000.
Suarez holds a B.A. in African History from New York University and an M.A. in the Social Sciences from the University of Chicago, where he studied urban affairs. A longtime member of the National Association of Hispanic Journalists, Suarez is a founding member of the Chicago Association of Hispanic Journalists.
