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2009 - 2010 McKnight Fellows

Ms. Catherine Gray is the Midwest Director of Strategy and Engagement at The White House Project and the lead communications trainer for organization. She specializes in training women for political leadership. She is responsible for fundraising and curriculum development.  Also a screenwriter and filmmaker, Ms. Gray has received several awards, including The Barry Morrow Screenwriting Fellowship in 2000 and Jerome Media Arts Grant in 2004.  She is an active member of Screenwriters' Workshop, Independent Feature Project, Women in Film and Television and serves on the board of TVbyGIRLS.  Ms. Gray attended Scripps College and earned a Bachelor in Fine Arts from Minneapolis College of Art and Design.

Ms. Mary Stucky is the co-founder, lead journalist, and President of Round Earth Media. She has broad media experience as a long-time contributor to national shows on public and commercial radio and TV including: National Public Radio, Public Radio International and America Public Media shows (i.e. Marketplace, The World, All Things Considered), CBS Radio, FRONTLINE/World, NBC-TV and ABC-TV affiliates, Telemundo, Univision and Gannett's KARE-TV in Minneapolis. Her reports on Chinese and Hmong immigrants were part of the documentary series “Crossing East,” which won a 2006 Peabody Award, broadcasting’s highest honor. Ms. Stucky’s reporting awards also include the New York Festival’s Gold World Medal. She is an honors graduate of Carleton College.

Mr. Louis Porter II is an assistant professor of communication and director of multicultural affairs at Northwestern College in St. Paul, Minnesota. He has won a Gertrude Johnson Williams Literary Award from Ebony magazine for his short story, “Reminders.” In 2008 he was selected to participate in the Black Writers Collaborative Retreat sponsored by the Givens Foundation for African American Literature. Mr. Porter holds a bachelor’s degree in journalism from Boston University and a Master of Arts in Liberal Studies from Hamline University in St. Paul.