Alicia Shepard

Who is Alicia Shepard?

Alicia C. Shepard is an American journalist, author, media writer and expert on the work and lives of Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein. Fall 2012 Shepard joined the University of Nevada, Las Vegas faculty as a guest professor for the Greenspun College of Urban Affairs. She joined National Public Radio in October, 2007, for a three-year appointment as the Ombudsman for the nonprofit public media organization that ended May 31, 2011. In that role, she said on June 21, 2009, that waterboarding, as practiced by Americans on terror captives, should not be called 'torture', although she later mentioned in an interview that "I think that it does... constitute torture." On this matter she claimed she was supporting an NPR policy originated by Managing Editor David Sweeney.

Shepard taught media ethics at Georgetown University to its masters program from 2007 until 2010. She also taught journalism at American University. She was a Times Mirror Visiting Professor at University of Texas at Austin for the 2005-2006 academic year, where she taught a class she designed on Watergate and the press.