Hurricane Katrina: CNN's Jeff Koinange was there. The 2005 Iraq elections: Jeff Koinange was there. The war on terror, an attempted coup in the Ivory Coast, the civil war in Liberia: Koinange was there.

From 1987 to 1989, however, Jeff Koinange was here - getting his associate's degree, and his start in broadcast journalism, at CUNY's Kingsborough Community College.

In fact, Kingsborough was the bridge between the Kenya native's days as a Pan Am World Airways flight attendant ­ where passengers often applauded the young man's recitation of in-flight safety announcements - and the world of professional journalism.

"I would stand at First Class and recite the announcements,as if performing on stage, and the response was amazing," said Koinange (pronounced Ko-e-nong-ay). Passengers "time and again would tell me 1 was wasting my tirne being a flight atten­dant and that I should go out and 'make some real money' with my voice. I guess I have to thank them for inspiring me to do what I'm doing now."

At 21, Koinange quit the airline and headed for the airwaves - at Kingsborough. It was 1987. "I was new to the States in general and Brooklyn in particular, so the closer the college was, the better," he said. "It turned out to be one of the best decisions r ever made.. .. Kingsborough had a"massive influence on my life."

Having seen the wlorld with Pan Am after high school in Kenya, he was already mature and worldly, he said. But the two­year college in Manhattan Beach opened new doors.

To hear his professors tell it, Koinange was a stellar student (valedictorian of his class of 1989), soccer star (KBCC's team won the City Championship for the two years he was there and he was voted CUNY student-athlete of the year in 1989) and peer leader who left a lasting impression on the school's staff before he moved on to New York University to earn his B.A. in broadcast journalism. They look forward to his return to Brooklyn June 12 as KBCC's 2006 commencement speaker.

Koinange is based in Johannesburg as Cable News Network's Africa Correspondent.

"Jeff was a wonderful young man, a real­ly outstanding student," recalled Marilyn Chernin, an adjunct counselor at KBCC who was dean of student life there in the late 1980s. "He was captain of the soccer team, business manager of the school paper, he was on the radio station, he was very active in student government, he was a peer advisor. He was certainly a man for all sea­sons, as they say - a renaissance man."

Kingsborough Communications Professor Cliff Hesse, who taught Koinange and was one of his broadcasting mentors, remembered the fledgling journalist as "a guy who really knew what liberal arts meant" and who deeply understood its value in helping him chart his professional course.

Hesse, who directs the school's Broadcast Technology and Management Program, said Koinange got his broadcasting start at Kingsborough's radio station, WKRB, 90.9 FM. "He was very, very inter­ested in that," says Hesse. "You could sense his natural ability. ... He knew the right place to be funny.and the right place to be serious."

He also stood out as a writer. Then as now, Hesse said, Koinange's reports reflected his personal warmth, thoughtfulness and worldly perspective.

"That's what I love about his work now - the humanity he shows in writing about people -, not just the event, but what it means to people," said Hesse.

Koinange has praise for his Kipgsborough mentors as well. "The best part about Kingsborough was the attention the professors paid to individual students, whether in English class or Psychology 101 or indeed Journalism, and even on the sports field," he said.

"The TV classes with Professor Hesse were...unforgettable," Koinange added. "They rein­forced my goals of pursuing a career in journalism, despite my 'English' accent at the time, despite the fact that I thought maybe I didn't stand a chance of working in the U.S. Professor Hesse assured me that I could be anything I wanted to be." Though Kingsborough gave him academic and professional tools and plenty of encouragement, Koinange also credits his early primary and secondary school education in Nairobi - mostly at "Saint Mary's, a Catholic school run by Irish Holy Ghost Fathers," for ingraining "discipline and team spirit," values critical to his success. The school also provided him with invaluable opportunities to perform, from annual opera presentations to the school's acting and debating clubs. Those activities, said Koinange, "prepared me for what I do now, namely standing in front of an audience without nervousness or 'stage fright,' though it does happen from time to time."

Koinange began his news career in 1991 .as a desk assistanant/off-air reporter for ABC, News in New York, followed by two years as a reporter and producer for Medical News Network. He produced for NBC News in 1994, then for Reuters Television from 1995 to 2001, with expanding responsibility for Africa coverage.

Then he joined CNN and has since covered major news throughout Africa and the Middle East, from the historic 2005 elections in Iraq to the commemoration of the lO-year anniversary of the Rwandan genocide that slaughtered up to 1 million people in 100 days. Previously CNN's Lagos bureau chief, Koinange now leads CNN's coverage of Africa. The excitement of having the opportunity "to inform, entertain and educate the world about a continent I'm passionate' about... to provide that insight, that little bit of news that will leave an audience member saying 'Wow' ..." is never-ending for Koinange. With his wife of seven years -"my greatest inspiration" - he said he hopes to someday raise a family in. South Africa or in his hometown', Nairobi.'

As for Kingsborough's commencement in June, "I really look forward to speaking from the heart, just like I do with my stories on CNN," Koinange said.


From Spring 2006 CUNY Matters.