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Kiran Alvi

Biography

Profile: May 13, 2011, was a momentous day in the life of Kiran Alvi.  The first member of her family to graduate from college, let alone graduate with honors, Kiran accepted her degree at the University of Southern California commencement and as she returned to her chair, diploma in hand, no doubt she thought of her academic and extracurricular accomplishments both at USC and earlier in community college.  An award-winning student reporter, Kiran covered stories in the Los Angeles area with seasoned journalists from around the country and the world.  That experience led to a temporary position as a broadcast reporter with Nile TV International when she spent a semester studying in Egypt.  She made a great number of friends in and out of the news business in the Middle East during that semester abroad, and upon her return to the USC campus she was able to cover the “Arab Spring” uprisings through those contacts.  What’s next for this pace-setting young Californian?  She will now be the first member of her family to attend graduate school as well, Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism, one of the premier programs in the nation. It’s been said that a true journalist knows a lot of things about a lot of things, and that fits Kiran to a tee.  In her spare time she sits at her computer “googling everything about everything!”

Inspiration: A great teacher and mentor is a true blessing, and in Kiran’s case that special person is Diane Winston, a well-respected former journalist, who now teaches at USC.  Dr. Winston, Kiran said, “taught me the importance of history, and specifically religion, in international affairs. . . . her class opened my eyes to new thoughts, perspectives, and ideas and has made me so much more passionate about specifically exploring religion in my news coverage. I really hope to be a journalist even remotely like her one day.”

Aspiration: For a career Kiran would like to do what she’s already done . . . she’d like to be a foreign correspondent based preferably in the Middle East.  How many 22-year-olds already can say they did that?  Kiran spent several months as an on-air reporter for an Egyptian news agency. 

Making a Difference: Kiran told herself before leaving for Egypt for a semester abroad that she would find a way to work as a journalist in Cairo. Less than a month into the semester, she landed a job as an on-air reporter and production assistant for the nation's state-run media outlet. “Going out on my first story with a camera crew and director was an unreal experience. There I was, covering a story in English in an Arab country with an Arabic-speaking crew when I had only imagined a small desk job, if even that.” When Kiran saw her story air on national television, “I felt more accomplished than ever before.”

Accolades: No surprise with what Kiran’s already accomplished as a newswoman that she was awarded USC’s Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism’s Departmental Honors.  She was also a Dean’s List graduate and received university-wide honors as well.

Interesting Fact: If you’ve read any of the above, you know by now that Kiran is not camera-shy when it comes to broadcast news or even regular videos, “but I'm very uncomfortable with having solo pictures taken of me. In fact, I have yet to take professionally necessary head shots.”

 

 

 

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