Ms. Collins brings over 20 years of experience in communications, advocacy, and development, having served in several UN offices including New York, Geneva, Bangkok, and Vienna. She has worked as a gender focal point for the Department of Global Communications (DGC) and has experience with issues related to youth engagement, sustainable development, human rights, and peacebuilding.

Prior to joining the UN, Ms. Collins was an award-winning television and radio producer in New York, Washington, DC, Los Angeles, Berlin, Türkiye and Iraq. She has also worked as a strategic partner manager for news partnerships at Facebook, where she focused on news integrity, news literacy, and building sustainable revenue models for media organizations.

Ms. Collins holds a Master of Science degree from Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism and a degree in political science and mass communications from the University of California, Berkeley.

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Mr. Stéphane Dujarric is the Spokesperson for the United Nations Secretary-General Mr. António Guterres. He was appointed as Spokesperson in February 2014 by then Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon. Stéphane had previously served as Spokesperson for United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan from 2005 to 2006 and then Deputy Communications Director for Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon from 2006 to 2007.

Prior to his current appointment, Stéphane was Director of News and Media for the United Nations Department of Global Communications, a position that he held from 2011 to 2014. In that role, he oversaw all of the UN’s television, radio and photo operations, and coordinated the work of the main United Nations news sites, operating in eight languages. His division was responsible for the international press corps, as well as coverage of official UN meetings, producing written coverage for the media, delegations and the general public. Prior to this assignment, Stéphane was Director of Communications for the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP).

Stéphane was named Chief Spokesperson for United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan in 2005, after joining the United Nations in 2000 as an Associate Spokesman. Following Annan’s departure, Stéphane worked as Deputy Communications Director for Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon.

Prior to joining the United Nations, Stéphane worked for ABC News television for close to ten years in various capacities in the network’s New York City, London and Paris news bureaus. He traveled extensively on assignment to cover major stories throughout Europe, Africa and the Middle East. Born in France, Dujarric has been living in the United States for the most part of the last 40 years. He is a graduate of Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service and an alumnus of the CPD Summer Institute in Public Diplomacy.

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Paloma Escudero is currently UN Women Director for the Division for Global Communication & Advocacy based in NY HQ. Previously she led UNICEF Global Division for Communication and Advocacy at NYHQ for a decade (2013-2023), followed by her appointment as UNICEF Global Advocate for Children and Climate Change. She joined UNICEF team on 2007 as the Executive Director of UNICEF Spain based in Madrid. Escudero started her professional career at the Marketing Division of Procter & Gamble Spain, moving to the non-profit sector first as Advocacy Director for OXFAM-INTERMON Spain, followed by her appointment as Director for the Oxfam International Advocacy Office to the EU based in Brussels (Belgium).
Paloma Escudero has Spanish nationality and lives in New York with her husband and her three sons.

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Kathryn develops communications strategies for the Better World Campaign and other advocacy teams throughout the United Nations Foundation. Prior to joining BWC, she was a strategic communications consultant for non-profits, NGO’s and corporations.

Kathryn began her career as a journalist. As a producer for ABC News Nightline, she traveled widely throughout the US and the world, covering domestic politics and international affairs. She was awarded five Emmys for her work during this time. She later became CNN’s first female Bureau Chief in Washington, DC, and managed a staff of 300 in the aftermath of 9/11. In 2006, she joined Bloomberg Television in Washington as Bureau Chief, tasked with developing new programming and building the company’s TV presence in the nation’s capital.

Kathryn received a Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of New Hampshire. She was awarded a Nieman Fellowship from Harvard during the 1994-95 academic year.

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David Ohana is Chief Communications and Marketing Officer at the United Nations Foundation where he leads global communication and engagement strategy. He has worked in advertising, production, branding and social impact for more than two decades, harnessing the power of some of the world’s most influential individuals and organizations – from Beyoncé to Ban Ki-moon — to reach billions, raise millions, and help change attitudes.

He is a globally experienced marketing and strategic communications leader who has led impactful partnerships and campaigns across the United Nations and private sector. Formally a creative with Saatchi & Saatchi, David joined the UN in 2008.

As Chief of Brand Building at UNICEF, David managed UNICEF’s Brand, Campaigns, Events and Goodwill Ambassador teams, along with the global rebranding of the organization.

Prior to this, David worked as the content producer for United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, and as Head of Film and Special Projects for the UN’s humanitarian arm, OCHA, producing content around the world from North Korea, to Niger, to the Polar Ice Rim. He has produced and directed path-breaking advocacy, awareness and fundraising projects with influencers including Charlize Theron, George Clooney, Shakira, David Guetta, Hugh Jackman and Beyoncé (their collaboration for World Humanitarian Day reaching over a billion people in 2012).

Most recently, as Global Head of Marketing, Brands & Campaigns for Minderoo Foundation, David wrote and produced Molly’s TED Talk on childhood brain development, delivered by a 7-year-old, which become the most viewed TED Talk in the world in 2021.

David has received over two dozen international film and advertising creativity and effectiveness awards, including Cannes Lions, One Show and consecutive MTV Music Video Award nominations. At age 24, he was named Young Australian of the Year for Community Service by Prime-Minister John Howard and awarded a Centenary Medal for his cause-based communications work in Timor-Leste.

He is a guest lecturer at NYU and has been interviewed on CNN, The Today Show and China Global on the work of UNICEF and the United Nations.

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Wolfgang Petritsch is the President of the Austrian Institute of International Affairs and of the Austrian Marshall Plan Foundation as well as Chair of the Herbert C. Kelman Institute for Interactive Conflict Transformation, Vienna-Jerusalem. In 2016 Wolfgang was a visiting professor at the universities of Vienna and UC Berkeley; 2013/14 he was the Joseph A. Schumpeter Fellow at Harvard University where he conducted research on humanitarian intervention. Wolfgang received his PhD in Southeastern European history from the University of Vienna. He was a post-Doc Fulbright scholar at the University of Southern California, Los Angeles.

From 1977 to 1983, Wolfgang was press secretary and deputy chief of cabinet, respectively, to Federal Chancellor Bruno Kreisky of Austria. In the 1980s, he was director of the Austrian Press and Information Service in New York and diplomatic Councilor at his country’s UN Mission. From 1993 to 1995, Wolfgang was charged by his government with the information campaign for Austria’s accession to the European Union.

In 1998/99, Wolfgang was the European Union’s Special Envoy and Chief Negotiator at the Kosovo peace talks in Rambouillet and Paris. Between 1999 and 2002, he was the International Community’s High Representative for Bosnia and Herzegovina in charge of the civilian implementation of the Dayton Peace Accords which ended the 1992–95 Bosnian war.

From 2002–2008 he was Austria’s Permanent Representative to the UN, the WTO, and the Conference on Disarmament (CD) in Geneva. As president of the UN Mine Ban Treaty from 2004 to 2006, Wolfgang chaired the 2005 Nairobi Summit for a Mine Free World. He co-negotiated the UN Cluster Munitions Ban Treaty 2007/08. From 2008 to 2013, he represented Austria at the Paris-based Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD).

Wolfgang has extensively published in domestic and international media. He is the author and editor of more than a dozen books, with an emphasis on the post-conflict region of Southeastern Europe, the EU and on humanitarian intervention. Wolfgang is i.a. the recipient of the European Award for Human Rights, Strasbourg 2007.

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Brigitte Perrin is a Swiss strategic communication expert, journalist and former Chief of Strategic Communications at the World Meteorological Organization (WMO). Throughout her career across the United Nations, academia (University of Geneva) and public broadcasting (RTS), she has led communication, branding and digital transformation initiatives on climate, weather and environmental issues, helping international organizations build trust through clear, science-based communication.

At WMO, she contributed to the United Nations’ Information Integrity Initiative, and created the multi-agency communication task force supporting the Early Warnings for All initiative, with a focus on strengthening the visibility and coherence of trusted scientific information across organizations.

She is the founder of the Earth Info Hub, an independent AI-powered public good initiative that addresses the fragmentation of climate and environmental knowledge across institutions. Her work explores how AI can strengthen information integrity, reinforce trust in authoritative science, and make reliable knowledge more accessible and actionable for communicators, journalists and decision-makers.

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www.earthinfohub.org

Dr. Phillip Arceneaux is an Associate Professor of Strategic Communication at Miami University of Ohio. His research, teaching, and public engagement sit at the intersection of public relations, political communication, and international affairs.

Dr. Arceneaux’s scholarship examines how communication shapes public opinion, organizational reputation, and strategic relationships in foreign policy and national security contexts. He focuses on the use of organizational storytelling to curate strategic narratives in public diplomacy, emphasizing how governments and international organizations use strategic communication to shape the political agenda, manage stakeholder perceptions, build trust, and advance policy objectives and outcomes. 

As a consultant, Dr. Arceneaux has advised on public diplomacy and public affairs initiatives across the U.S. diplomatic, defense, and intelligence communities. He has also served in a research capacity with the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and the Center for Strategic and International Studies. 

At Miami, Dr. Arceneaux serves as Director of the Diplomacy Lab, a public-private partnership with the U.S. Department of State that connects students and faculty with real-world diplomatic and policy challenges. Through collaboration with U.S. embassies and consulates, he oversees experiential learning initiatives that expose students to public policy research and careers in diplomacy, security, and international communication. 

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