Ayesha Rascoe, White House correspondent for National Public Radio, will be the honoree for the 2019 Mary Alice Davis Distinguished Lecture in Journalism at UT-Austin. The program, which will feature questions from a panel of students and educators, will take place on Monday, Oct. 28, at the Belo Center for New Media Auditorium, with the time tentatively scheduled for 5:30 p.m. More details will come later.
The lecture program honors Mary Alice Davis, who retired as an Austin American-Statesman columnist and editorial writer in 2002. After her death from ovarian cancer in 2004, her husband, Jim Davis, and daughter, Rachel Davis, established the lectureship in her name with the goal of bringing noted journalists to the campus for the benefit of students and the general public.
The first honoree was New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd in November 2005. She was followed by the late Molly Ivins, Jim Lehrer, Michele Norris, Dan Rather, a panel of journalists talking about covering gang warfare and terror in Mexico, Leonard Pitts, the late David Carr, Eugene Robinson, Candy Crowley, Lisa Falkenberg, Ernesto Londono, John Avlon and Pamela Colloff.
Upon graduation from Howard University, Rascoe joined Reuters Professional News as an energy reporter, covering news on energy and environmental policy. During her time at Reuters, she was also an intern in New York and Washington.
In January 2016, Rascoe started working as the White House correspondent for Reuters. In April 2018, she became the White House reporter for NPR. For more information on her, go to Who is Ayesha Rascoe? Everything You Need to Know