New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof  and his wife, banker and author Sheryl WuDunn, dropped in this morning (Friday, Aug. 2) on a session of the UO's Summer Academy To Inspire Learning (SAIL) and shared stories about their work and the paths that led them to it.

Kristof grew up on a sheep and cherry farm near Yamhill before graduating from Harvard College and then studying law as a Rhodes Scholar at Oxford University's Magdalen College. WuDunn grew up in New York, graduated from Cornell University and then earned an MBA from Harvard Business School and a master's degree in public administration from Princeton University.

One of the SAIL students asked WuDunn about the college experience.

"You get to meet people from places you've never even heard of," she said.

Kristof said he progressed from working at his high school newspaper – and doing part-time work at the same time for the three-issues-per-week McMinnville NewsRegister – to an internship at the Salem Statesman Journal, a reporting job at the Washington Post and then a six-month trial period at the New York Times.

"I've been there ever since," said Kristof, who has won two Pulitzer Prizes.

SAIL is a pipeline program at the UO that aims to make higher education a realistic goal for disadvantaged middle school and high school students.

Watch for the full story on the visit by Kristof and WuDunn at AroundtheO.