New faces, new roles at The Seattle Globalist

This week we are announcing several exciting changes and additions to The Seattle Globalist team.

Sanjay Bhatt joining the Globalist board of directors. (Photo courtesy Sanjay Bhatt)
Sanjay Bhatt is joining the Globalist board of directors. (Photo courtesy Sanjay Bhatt)

Veteran journalist Sanjay Bhatt has joined The Seattle Globalist board of directors. Bhatt worked as a reporter at The Seattle Times for more than a dozen years covering everything from real estate to education, and has won numerous national awards. He’s also served on the boards of the Seattle chapter of the Asian American Journalists Association (AAJA) and the national Association of Health Care Journalists (AHCJ).

Melissa Lin, a recent graduate of the Seattle University journalism program and outgoing editor of the student newspaper there, is already halfway through her tenure as the Globalist’s Summer 2016 Reporting Intern. She has written about homelessness, arts and social change, and the five Taiwanese words she wishes we had in English. She is in the midst of reporting a long-term project about mental health in Asian American communities.

Former Globalist Youth Apprentice Alia Marsha, a recent UW Bothell grad who grew up in Jakarta, Indonesia, will officially become a Globalist junior reporter as soon as her “OPT” — a program for newly graduated international students — is approved. But she’s already gotten a jump start, reporting a story on campus activism for racial justice that was picked up by The Nation.

And Goorish Wibneh is the current record-holder for number of promotions in the history of The Seattle Globalist. Wibneh started writing for the Globalist as a freelancer in early 2015, and then became our first summer reporting intern. Later in 2015 he was honored with a Globie Award for his reporting, and then promoted to reporter. Today, we are pleased to announce that he has been promoted to columnist. Stay tuned for his forthcoming column about how a popular STEM program is threatened by Yesler Terrace’s redevelopment.