Isabella Kurkowski is Managing Director of a 27 country EU media project entitled “Covering Cohesion Policy in Europe – Training MOOC for European Journalism Students” (COPE), which is implemented by the Technical University Dortmund.
Kurkowski is an international media development expert and lecturer at the Erich Brost Institute for International Journalism of the Technical University Dortmund, Germany. She has led different EU media projects in the past and supported the implementation of media self-regulatory institutions in several countries. Focus of her work are media development, media democracy and media accountability in post-conflict countries.
Kurkowski worked from 2019 to 2023 as Regional Coordinator of projects in the MENA region at the Erich Brost Institute for International Journalism, including the countries Algeria, Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon, Libya, Morocco, Sudan, Syria and Tunisia. From 2014-2018 she was deployed as Country Representative of DW Akademie in Myanmar and from 2007-2013 as seconded Media Expert Advisor to the Executive Director of the Press Council in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
Prior to this she was from 2003-2007 the Media Programme Manager of Media-Im-Pakt and worked as intermediary organization for the Stability Pact for South East Europe under the EU Media Task Force as well as the Germany Foreign Office and was responsible for the coordination of media development projects in eleven countries of the Western Balkans with a distribution of funds worth 3,4 Mio EUR per year.
Kurkowski is providing consultancy related to Media Accountability and Media Development towards the OSCE, UNESCO, European Commission as well as the Council of Europe.