Lynn Freeman is the host and co-producer of National Radio's Monday to Friday live arts and entertainment programme, What's Going On?

It was selected by an international judge as the best Radio Current Affairs programme in this year's national Qantas Media Awards, a rare event for an arts show. The judge praised the show's entertaining presentation, conversational interviewing style and excellent production values. This incorporates regional, national and international material on the programme. In fact she will be reporting live into What's Going On from the Dublin Theatre and Fringe Festivals, as well as writing articles for the press and collecting interviews for use on Radio New Zealand and in her thesis being produced at Oxford University.

She also produces Chris Laidlaw's Sunday Morning current affairs programme on National Radio. This programme was short listed for the best Radio Current Affairs programme in this year's Qantas Media Awards. She will be identifying potential interviewees for Chris while in Dublin.

Lynn's background is in news, having been a Chief Reporter at one of Radio New Zealand's metropolitan stations for almost ten years. Her great passion is the arts, as an actor, playwright and director in student and non-professional theatre, and as a theatre critic for six years in Wellington.

She has also just completed a 14 part radio documentary series on the story of New Zealand theatre, called Encore. It is one of the most ambitious programmes Radio New Zealand has undertaken in recent years, involving more than 60 interviews with theatre practitioners and historians, dozens of archival interviews and a year's work.

Lynn won the three month David Low Chevening Fellowship through Reuters and the British Council, and will be starting at Oxford University on the 6th October. While at Oxford she will be looking at the way the arts are valued - culturally and economically, in Ireland and the UK. Also how the arts are structured, funded and used as an important part of regional and national tourism campaigns.

Lynn will be in Dublin from the afternoon of 30 September until the morning of 6 October, with her trusty dat machine for recording interviews and atmosphere.

IFNZ has offered Lynn, Producer Radio New Zealand, $2000 to cover travel and accommodation expenses in Ireland. Lynn will be reporting on funding for the arts in Ireland and is expected to secure coverage in both print and radio media for the Ireland Fund and Irish arts and culture in general. She will travel to Dublin in late September and has also asked for assistance in arranging an itinerary while there.