MIAMI – A veteran international journalist and an experienced cultural policy researcher have joined the expanding staff at the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation as program officers.

Yves Colon becomes the Foundation’s first journalism program officer and will report to Eric Newton, director of Journalism Initiatives. Colon has been a veteran reporter, editor and columnist during a 15-year career with The Miami Herald, most recently as Caribbean correspondent. He has also worked as director of the multicultural management program and lecturer at the University of Missouri School of Journalism and as assistant city editor for the Columbia Missourian. He was a Creole Service editor for the Voice of America in Washington, D.C.

Colon earned master’s degrees in both journalism and French literature from the University of Missouri-Columbia. He also holds a bachelor’s degree in political science and languages from Brooklyn College.

Colon’s most notable awards include the Medal of Valor from the U.S. State Department for helping save the lives of 13 US journalists during elections in Haiti in 1987 and the Spot News Award from the Inter American Press Association.

Heidi Rettig joins Knight Foundation as a content program officer reporting to John Bare, director of program development and evaluation. Rettig previously worked for The Urban Institute in Washington, DC, as a research associate on the evaluation of the Wallace-Reader’s Digest Funds’ Community Partnerships for Cultural Participation initiative. She has also served as a research associate at Edinburgh College of Art in the school of planning and housing.

Rettig earned her master’s of science degree in social anthropology from the University of Edinburgh and a bachelor’s degree in liberal studies from Georgetown University.

The John S. and James L. Knight Foundation promotes excellence in journalism worldwide and invests in the vitality of 26 US communities.