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.
-
In his new book, the award-winning journalist chronicles the 26-day walk he took in 2021 from Washington, D.C., to New York City, and how the people and places he encountered changed his perspectives on the world. -
A Democrat who served 8 years as former Governor Hogan's Ag Secretary, family farmer Joe Bartenfelder discusses his legacy, his successor, and the challenges ahead for Maryland's producers. -
The head of the Mayor's office administering the $641 million in federal American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funds describes how the city's been putting that money to use. -
The MD delegate and former Asst. MD Attorney General discusses her role as lead investigator and author of the new report on the state's 4-year probe into past child sex abuse by members of the Archdiocese of Baltimore. -
"Maryland Matters" editor Josh Kurtz and WYPR news director Matt Bush discuss which bills passed and which didn't during the 90-day lawmaking session that wrapped at midnight Monday. -
The acclaimed writer discusses her shimmering new novel about life's comforting routines and inescapable losses. -
Theater critic J. Wynn Rousuck describes the STC & Woolly Mammoth co-production as an immersive - and moving - exploration of the refugee experience. -
Midday movie mavens Ann Hornaday of the Washington Post and Jed Dietz of the Maryland Film Festival join us for our monthly look at what's new in films and filmmaking. -
Reporters' analysis of the findings of the 4-year investigation, voices of parishioners and abuse survivors, and perspectives from a doctor who treats sexual abuse. -
NY Times correspondent Luke Broadwater and UBalt legal scholar Kim Wehle offer insights on the unprecedented criminal indictment of the former president, and its political and legal ramifications.
