Breakfast With NPR’s Daniel Zwerdling

In a time of fake news and alternative facts, when librarians and educators are concerned more than ever about news literacy and the protection of a free and independent press, our guest speaker is NPR’s Daniel Zwerdling—one of the best known and most acclaimed investigative journalists in America, winner of a long list of awards including the Peabody, DuPont, Robert F. Kennedy, Edward R. Murrow, George Polk, and many others.

Zwerdling is an agent of tremendous social change. The Pentagon launched a top-level investigation after Zwerdling reported that the Army has kicked out tens of thousands of troops returning from wars with mental health problems or brain injuries. After another series revealing that the military failed to diagnose and treat tens of thousands of troops with traumatic brain injuries from explosions, Congressional investigations led the Pentagon to change the way it treats brain injury victims. Harsh treatment of immigrants, including the use of attack dogs to terrorize non-citizens. The ill-fated space shuttle Challenger launch, despite warnings that it might explode. The poisoning of citizens by the pesticide Chlordane. Highest injury rates to nurses among all professionals. These and many other issues reported by Zwerdling have resulted in changes to laws and to lives.