On The Journalism Salute we interview journalists about who they are and what they do with the intent of showing that journalists are not the enemy. Today we're joined by Alan Tai. Alan just won the Journalism Education Association's Student Journalist of the Year award as a senior at Monta Vista High School in California.

Alan talked about his experiences on the student newspaper, El Estoque as an editor-in-chief and also as a writer of features and op-eds. He explained what the school's journalism program is like and how it successfully deals with school administration. He also shared lessons he learned and offered tips to guide future editors-in-chief.

This is the 4th straight year we've interviewed the national winner of that award, the first of them was Anushka De, also from Monta Vista High School.

 Alan's salutes: The Journalism Education Association, Student Press Law Center, Columbia Scholastic Press Association, and The News Literacy Project.

Story examples:

Feature on local residents who were military veterans

https://elestoque.org/2022/11/11/features/american-heroes/

Cheat GPT: Is It Time To Kill The Essay?

https://elestoque.org/2023/03/21/opinion/cheatgpt-is-it-time-to-kill-the-essay/

Thank you for listening. You can e-mail me at [email protected]

Visit our website: thejournalismsalute.org 

Mark’s website (MarkSimonmedia.com)

Tweet us at @journalismpod and Bluesky at @marksimon.bsky.social

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On this episode we're joined by Alexandra Lange. She is a journalist, design critic, author and teacher. She was recently named the 2025 Pulitzer Prize winner in criticism for a series of pieces at Bloomberg CityLab about designing cities for families. The judges wrote:

For graceful and genre-expanding writing about public spaces for families, deftly using interviews, observations and analysis to consider the architectural components that allow children and communities to thrive.

Her portfolio encompassed 7 pieces in all, spaced out from March to December of 2024. You can find the stories here:

https://www.pulitzer.org/winners/22649

Alexandra shared her approach to writing these stories, providing multiple examples of the choices she made at different points along the way. She also spoke about the evolution of architectural criticism and how her writing is similar to that which you would see in op-ed pieces written at the high school, college, or professional level.

 Alexandra's salutes: Critical Minded and also journalism unions

Thank you for listening. You can e-mail me at [email protected]

Visit our website: thejournalismsalute.org 

Mark’s website (MarkSimonmedia.com)

Tweet us at @journalismpod and Bluesky at @marksimon.bsky.social

Subscribe to our newsletter– journalismsalute.substack.com

On this episode, Mark Simon is joined by Ayaan Shah. He's the Pennsylvania Student Journalist of the Year and newly graduated from Emmaus High School in Emmaus, Pennsylvania. Ayaan and I live in the same county- Lehigh County.

Ayaan talked about his journalism interests. He shared the story of covering Joe Biden's appearance in his town and one interview from that experience that stood out. He also told the story of another highlight, covering governor Josh Shapiro's press conference at his school.

Ayaan explained the work he did as editor-in-chief of his school newspaper, The Stinger and what it was like to be a teaching assistant for a journalism class.

Ayaan's salutes: Emmaus teachers/advisors Shelby Ramirez, Denise Freeman, and Matthew Shaw, and journalist Mehdi Hasan.

Articles

Biden protest coverage

https://stingerehs.com/17358/news/biden-visits-emmaus-encounters-protestors/

Shapiro press conference

https://stingerehs.com/17650/news/pennsylvania-governor-josh-shapiro-visits-emmaus-high-school-to-promote-new-education-budget/

Pro-Palestinian Protests

https://stingerehs.com/17254/features/lehigh-valley-pro-palestinian-movement-echoes-national-trends/

Thank you for listening. You can e-mail me at [email protected]

Visit our website: thejournalismsalute.org 

Mark’s website (MarkSimonmedia.com)

Tweet us at @journalismpod and Bluesky at @marksimon.bsky.social

Subscribe to our newsletter– journalismsalute.substack.com

On this episode, we're joined by Justin Baxley. Justin is a journalist based in the south who just completed 3 years working as a digital content manager for 13 WMAZ in Macon, Georgia.

He is in the process of transitioning to a new journalism job, but we wanted to talk to him now at the suggestion of Kristen Hare, our recent guest from the Poynter Institute.

 Justin's father Michael was killed in 2017 in what is believed to be a robbery (multiple arrests were made just this February). Justin went through the experience of grieving his father while having to deal with probes from many different media outlets.

To give families of victims more control, Justin created the More Than A Number website, whose purpose is "To honor lives lost to violent crime, support their loved ones and promote more empathetic journalism."

The project, done as part of a Poynter fellowship, won a national journalism innovation award.

We talked to Justin about that project and other notable accomplishments from his journalism career.

Justin's salutes: Nick Wooten, Dallas Morning News; Kati Kokal, WUWM-Milwaukee.

More Than A Number Website

https://www.13wmaz.com/more-than-a-number

More Than A Number YouTube link

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLc8Ny6J4NZVlbJaWRYVdNiXwDmk6IC3Zc

Thank you for listening. You can e-mail me at [email protected]

Visit our website: thejournalismsalute.org 

Mark’s website (MarkSimonmedia.com)

Tweet us at @journalismpod and Bluesky at @marksimon.bsky.social

Subscribe to our newsletter– journalismsalute.substack.com

On this episode we're joined by Roberto Camacho. Roberto is Chicano (an American of Mexican heritage), a freelance journalist who often writes about issues impacting local immigrants, especially Chicanos but touches on other subjects too, like hip hop culture. He is based in San Diego and is a 2017 graduate of Arizona State University.

Roberto talked about life as a freelancer, connecting with communities that haven't had good relationships with American journalists in the past, and how he looks for stories about groups that are closest to the harm that's being done. He also shared examples of his writing about groups protecting undocumented people from ICE, pollution in local neighborhoods, and hip hop.

Story examples

Protecting Immigrants from Ice

https://boltsmag.org/how-volunteer-patrols-are-working-to-protect-san-diego-immigrant-communities-from-ice/

Port Communities Long Fight Against Industrial Pollution Emissions Impact

https://nextcity.org/features/san-diego-port-communities-long-fight-industrial-pollution-emissions-impact

Neighborhood Kids Bring Revolutionary Message To Hip Hop

https://www.calonews.com/featured-topics/culture/the-neighborhood-kids-bring-revolutionary-messages-back-to-hip-hop/article_39a80635-98a3-494b-987b-694e20336338.html

 Group Documenting Latino People Killed By Police

https://www.palabranahj.org/archive/the-heavy-toll

 Roberto's salutes: Ruben Salazar, Shaun King, Brandon Loran Maxwell, Aysha Khan, Abraham Marquez, Ben Camacho, Jeremiah Cothren and all the journalists in Gaza.

 Visit our website: thejournalismsalute.org 

Mark’s website (MarkSimonmedia.com)

Tweet us at @journalismpod and Bluesky at @marksimon.bsky.social

Subscribe to our newsletter– journalismsalute.substack.com

On this episode we're joined by Mollie Simon. Mollie has been a research reporter for ProPublica for the last 5 years, working oftentimes behind the scenes on stories such as ones we've talked to past guests about. She's also been a newspaper reporter in South Carolina and a data researcher for LegiStorm.

She is a graduate of the University of Georgia with dual degrees in public affairs journalism and political science.

Mollie talked about the skills needed to be a researcher and work behind-the-scenes on stories and projects. She also provided examples of the types of stories she's worked on, including one about a homebuying franchise that was using inappropriate methods to take advantage of seller desperation.

Thank you as always for listening. Please send us feedback to [email protected] 

Story example

"The ugly truth behind We Buy Ugly Houses"

https://www.propublica.org/article/ugly-truth-behind-we-buy-ugly-houses

 Mollie's salutes: Specialty team members, copy editors, newsroom lawyers, newspapers that invest in investigative reporting, and journalism "ex-pats."

Visit our website: thejournalismsalute.org 

Mark’s website (MarkSimonmedia.com)

Tweet us at @journalismpod and Bluesky at @marksimon.bsky.social

Subscribe to our newsletter– journalismsalute.substack.com

On this episode, we're joined by Tara García Mathewson. Tara is a bilingual reporter covering the intersection of education and technology, particularly the harms within them, both on a national and state level for The Markup and CalMatters.

The Markup is a non-profit newsroom that challenges technology to serve the public good. A motto often within its stories is 'report deeply and fix things.' Its stories combine news reporting and data analysis and 'The Markup Method' means they show their work.

CalMatters is a non-partisan and non-profit news organization covering California policies and politics to make the government more transparent and accountable.

Tara talked about her experience covering artificial intelligence, technological surveillance, and digital censorship in education and the work that went into specific stories. She also spoke about the benefit of getting a background in newspaper reporting before working for non-profit journalism outlets.

At the end of the episode, we were joined by Chris Daggett, interim executive director of the New Jersey Information Consortium, which provides funding to online news outlets and students interested in studying journalism. Chris talked about potential budget cuts that would jeopardize what the organization is able to do. You can learn more about it and what you can do to help here.

https://njcivicinfo.org/

Work examples:

Digital Book Banning

https://themarkup.org/digital-book-banning/2024/04/13/schools-were-just-supposed-to-block-porn-instead-they-sabotaged-homework-and-censored-suicide-prevention-sites

Technological surveillance

https://themarkup.org/machine-learning/2023/11/30/he-wanted-privacy-his-college-gave-him-none

Artificial intelligence

https://calmatters.org/education/k-12-education/2025/03/school-counselors-ai-chatbots/

Tara's salutes: The 74, Caitlin Dickerson (The Atlantic), Hannah Dreier (New York Times)

Thank you as always for listening. Please send us feedback to [email protected] 

 Visit our website: thejournalismsalute.org 

Mark’s website (MarkSimonmedia.com)

Tweet us at @journalismpod and Bluesky at @marksimon.bsky.social

Subscribe to our newsletter– journalismsalute.substack.com

On this episode we're joined by Daniel Newman. Daniel is a digital content producer for Cleveland Jewish News in Cleveland Ohio. He's an early-career journalist who also spent a year as a news reporter for the Tribune Chronicle in Warren, Ohio. He's a native of Youngstown, Ohio and a 2023 graduate of Cleveland State University, where he spent a year as news editor of the student newspaper. 

Daniel discussed his upbringing and multi-layered racial religious background and what he's enjoying about working for a Jewish media outlet. He walked us through the different elements of his job, gave examples of what he's covered, and shared several other interests he has.

Work example: Cleveland Museum of Natural History Transformation

Daniel's salute: Chris McBride, Tribune-Chronicle

Thank you as always for listening. Please send us feedback to [email protected] 

 Visit our website: thejournalismsalute.org 

Mark’s website (MarkSimonmedia.com)

Tweet us at @journalismpod and Bluesky at @marksimon.bsky.social

Subscribe to our newsletter– journalismsalute.substack.com

On this episode we're joined by Miranda Green. Miranda is a freelance investigative reporter based in Los Angeles. She was the director of investigations at Floodlight news covering corporations and political interests stalling climate action.

She's also previously worked for Newsweek, The Daily Beast, Decode DC, CNN, the Hill, and Huffington Post. She's a graduate of George Washington University.

I became interested in talking to Miranda after I found stories she wrote about a specific way in which misinformation about climate science is spreading.

We spent much of the episode discussing how she reported on those stories, how those are both individual stories and also a problem for the journalism industry, and advice she has on covering one story that may lead to many more stories.

Examples of coverage:

Chevron owns a newspaper

https://mirandacgreen.com/chevron-owns-this-citys-news-site-many-stories-arent-told-2/

The North Dakota "newspaper" and a Greenpeace lawsuit

https://www.niemanlab.org/2025/03/a-pipeline-company-is-suing-greenpeace-for-300-million-a-pay-to-play-newspaper-is-accused-of-tainting-the-jury-pool/

How an Alabama utility wields influence by financing news

https://mirandacgreen.com/control-the-narrative-how-an-alabama-utility-wields-influence-by-financing-news/

Miranda's salute: Byron Tau, investigative reporter, AP

Thank you as always for listening. Please send us feedback to [email protected] 

 Visit our website: thejournalismsalute.org 

Mark’s website (MarkSimonmedia.com)

Tweet us at @journalismpod and Bluesky at @marksimon.bsky.social

Subscribe to our newsletter– journalismsalute.substack.com

On our 221st episode, we're joined by Kristen Hare. Kristen is Poynter Institute's director of craft and local news. She teaches local journalists the skills they need to serve and cover their communities. Previously she covered the people of business and local news for Poynter. She's based near Tampa, Florida. 

We covered a wide range of topics with Kristen, including what local news looks like in 2025, tips she has for maximizing local news coverage, and how she views the work of college students helping local news thrive and the role of newsletters in covering local news.

And she talked about one of her passions- obituary writing (our first obituaries discussion!).

Kristen's salute: Justin Baxley, WMAZ

Thank you as always for listening. Please send us feedback to [email protected] 

Visit our website: thejournalismsalute.org 

Mark’s website (MarkSimonmedia.com)

Tweet us at @journalismpod and Bluesky at @marksimon.bsky.social

Subscribe to our newsletter– journalismsalute.substack.com