Rob Sivak
Contributing producer, MiddayRob Sivak is a contributing producer for Midday, with host Tom Hall. Recently retired after a seven-year stint as Midday's senior producer, Rob joined WYPR in 2015 as senior producer of Hall's previous show, Maryland Morning (which aired its final broadcast on September 16th, 2016). Before coming to the station, Rob enjoyed a 36-year career at the congressionally funded global broadcaster, Voice of America. At VOA, he honed his skills as a news and feature reporter, producer, editor and program host.
After reporting assignments at VOA's New York City, United Nations and Los Angeles bureaus, Rob spent two decades covering international food, farming and nutrition issues for VOA's 180-million worldwide listeners, and created and hosted several popular VOA science magazines. At Midday, he continued to pursue his passion for radio and his abiding interests in science, health, technology and politics.
Rob grew up as an ex-pat "oil brat" on the Persian Gulf coast of Saudi Arabia, and studied and traveled widely in the Middle East, Europe and Africa. He attended Hofstra University in New York and Boston University's School of Public Communications. Rob and his wife Caroline Barnes, a writer, live in Silver Spring, Maryland, where they've raised three daughters.
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Theater critic J. Wynn Rousuck spotlights the Frederick company's new production of a classic and controversial feminist drama about a woman's search for autonomy and personal fulfillment. -
Two resale shops run by the Women's Board of The Johns Hopkins Hospital sell used apparel and other goods to help fund patient-care services. Two volunteers at the shops join us to explain the ethics behind the business. -
The president of the Green Burial Association of Maryland, Jennifer Downs, and funeral reform advocate Lee Webster discuss the movement toward more environmentally benign interment practices. -
The former office of the pioneering Black jurist is to be restored as a legal and social services hub for Baltimore's Marble Hill community. Her son, former state senator Michael B. Mitchell, discusses his mother's legacy. -
The successful marketing executive and career expert offers insights on how and where job seekers can find work that matches their values and lifestyles. -
Maryland's Democratic junior senator discusses the Supreme Court's burgeoning corruption scandal, the Sen. Feinstein imbroglio, and the looming debt limit vote. -
BMA's new director, Asma Naeem, and Education Chief Gamynne Guillotte, plus the new director at the Maryland Center for History and Culture, Katie Caljean, discuss current exhibitions and innovative directions at the two museums. -
After two teens were shot during a large evening gathering of young people at the Inner Harbor last week, Mayor Scott ordered a curfew for under-17 kids to begin at the end of May. Our guests discuss the pros, and cons, of youth curfews. -
Writer Bonnie Garmus discusses why her first novel about a smart, self-assured young woman in early 1960s America has become a run-away best seller. -
Midday theater critic J. Wynn Rousuck spotlights the Tony Award-winning 2019 musical that blends two mythic tales into a haunting theatrical experience.
