About

Based in Washington, D.C. Kalina Newman is a communications expert currently working at the American Federation of County, State and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) as a Senior Digital Communications Coordinator. Previously, she was at the AFL-CIO, America’s largest federation of labor unions, where she built the federation’s presence in the press and on social media, helped produce a national convention, coined the term Striketober, and walked a few dozen picket lines.

In 2019, Kalina graduated from Boston University with a B.S. in Journalism and a concentration in Urban Sociology. In 2022, she graduated from George Washington University with an M.A. in Media and Strategic Communications. Her thesis explored the intersection of TikTok’s emergence as a dominating social media platform, virality, and the effectiveness of short-term video on persuasive political messaging.

In her work as a journalist, Kalina has reported on everything from breaking news, transportation, dining, state government, local news, cannabis, real estate, and more. Her writing has been published in the Washington Post, Teen Vogue, Eater, Washingtonian Magazine, the Boston Globe, Refinery29, Apartment Therapy, DCist, and The Week UK.

Kalina currently resides with her husband Alex and their two cats, Honey and Wilbur. When she’s not scouring the internet for the latest updates to social media algorithms, you can find her testing new recipes, at movie screenings, or on a hike (everyone needs to touch grass sometimes, right?).