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Hannah Ramirez

Before joining The Uvalde Leader-News, Hannah Psalma Ramirez worked as an education policy intern for POLITICO, where she reported on stories at the intersection of artificial intelligence and immigration. She has also interned and freelanced across several newsrooms in San Diego CA, focusing on investigative and public affairs reporting. In 2025, Ramirez was selected as a Carnegie-Knight News21 fellow, where she contributed to a national reporting project examining how military service members were being targeted by immigration enforcement policies. Born and raised in San Diego, Ramirez is a proud graduate of San Diego State University, where she studied journalism and served as an opinion editor for the university’s student newspaper. When she’s not reporting, Ramirez enjoys exploring local coffee shops and getting lost in a good book, often balancing both at once.

Nick Mott

Nick Mott covers the Greater covers wildlife, public lands, water and wildfire, and their impacts on communities and landscapes in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem for Montana Free Press and Mountain Journal. His position is part of a partnership with High Country News Western Environmental Collaborative (WERC). Prior to joining Report for America as a corps member, Mott worked in both print and audio. He led podcasting efforts at Montana Public Radio, and his narrative nonfiction productions received some of the highest awards in the field, including a Peabody and two National Edward R. Murrow Awards. He co-authored the book This Is Wildfire, published in 2023 by Bloomsbury, and his print and audio reporting has appeared in High Country News, NPR, The Washington Post, The Atlantic, The New York Times and many other outlets.

James Soderling

James Soderling is an education reporter at CivicLex as part of a pilot partnership with Press Forward Blue Grass, which trains community members to work as journalists in their hometowns. Soderling was born and raised in Muhlenberg County, Kentucky, and is a recent graduate of Transylvania University. Before joining Report for America, Soderling reported for his university's newspaper, The Rambler, and worked at Community Action Council through his AmeriCorps service. He also interned at Kentucky Refugee Ministries and worked on Charles Booker's U.S. Senate campaign. Soderling's interest in journalism was solidified through his thesis on coal-dependent communities in transition, which combined on-the-ground reporting tactics with policy research to examine how places like his hometown adapt to economic change.

Olivia Bensimon

Olivia Bensimon covers Baltimore County for The Baltimore Banner. Prior to this role, she was a freelance journalist specializing in people-centered reporting on topics such as immigration, breaking news, protests, court cases, and local happenings. A longtime New York reporter, she has written for a variety of news outlets like The New York Times, Hell Gate, Crain’s New York Business, and City Limits. She previously roamed the streets for both of the city’s tabloids and cut her teeth as a runner at the New York Post. In 2025, she won a Front Page Award from the Newswomen’s Club of New York for a local feature she wrote for The New York Times about an asylum-seeking family from Guinea. She is a graduate of New York University and the Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism at CUNY.

Trebor Maitin

Trebor Maitin covers the futures beat for Rappahannock News and Foothills Forum. Before joining Report for America, Maitin was a reporter at Centre Daily Times in Pennsylvania, where he wrote about everything from politics to agriculture to ghost towns. An alumnus of Lafayette College, Maitin served as managing editor of the student newspaper, The Lafayette. While in college, he interned with the Pennsylvania Legislative Correspondents' Association and freelanced for The Morning Call and the Pocono Record, his hometown papers. Maitin also holds a master's degree in journalism from Columbia Journalism School.

Jessica Pearce

Before joining The Journal, Pearce interned with NonDoc Media, covering everything from Tribal Council elections to housing legislation. She also interned with Oklahoma Watch, where she reported on the sunset of a statewide school counseling program. Pearce is a recent graduate of Oklahoma State University, where she earned bachelor's degrees in journalism and political science. When she's not in the office, Pearce enjoys reading, cooking and travelling.

Jose Sandoval

Jose reports on Latino communities in the Finger Lakes region for WXXI Public Media. Prior to joining WXXI News, Jose acted as the bilingual local All Things Considered Host and general assignment reporter for Blue Ridge Public Radio where he reported on elections, language access, and contributed to BPR's award winning Hurricane Helene coverage. His journalism career started as a producer for the Hola initiative at WNIJ and later as an intern with NPR’s content development team. An Illinoisan, Jose enjoys hiking, playing basketball, and listening to music from artists like J. Cole, Feid, and Bad Bunny.

Julia Gentin

Before joining The Santa Fe New Mexican, Gentin interned at The Hechinger Report, where she covered the shutdown of Climate.gov and the rollback of federal clean energy tax credits. Previously, she investigated the bureaucratic neglect of a public housing complex in Savannah's oldest Black neighborhood for The Current GA. She has also interned for the Student Press Law Center, which helped both her mothers' and her own high school papers fight censorship, and written features for Embarcadero Media, located in her native Silicon Valley. Gentin graduated from Amherst College with degrees in Spanish and Law, Jurisprudence, and Social Thought. At Amherst, she served as managing news editor of The Amherst Student, covering the fall of affirmative action and expanding the paper's reach into the town and surrounding communities. Her senior thesis explored transitional justice and literature in Chile, where she studied abroad. In her free time, she enjoys running, singing, playing soccer and reading.

Katie Reuther

Katie Reuther is a Chinese American audio journalist whose work explores culture, food systems, and community storytelling. Prior to joining KUCB as a regional reporter for the Aleutian Islands, Reuther produced broadcast and on-demand content for Marketplace, APM Studios, Out There podcast, and Heritage Radio Network. Her independent work has been archived by the Vermont Folklife Center and the Library of Congress, and published by the Smithsonian Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage. In 2019, she received a Fulbright grant to research organic agriculture in China. Before transitioning to audio journalism, Reuther earned a bachelor’s degree in neuroscience from Middlebury College and a master’s degree in food studies from Chatham University. She is an AIR New Voices alum and a graduate of the Salt Institute.

Samuel Collins Hicks

Samuel Collins Hicks is a public health and public interest reporter at MEDIALEX Community Newsroom as part of a pilot partnership with Press Forward Blue Grass, which trains community members to work as journalists in their hometowns. Before joining Report for America, Hicks was the city editor for the LEXtoday newsletter, delivering daily news to an audience of +40,000. He is also a poet, essayist, and TV/film actor. His debut essay Very Truly Yours was nominated for a Pushcart Prize by Purple Ink Press, and his poems have appeared in multiple anthologies from Workhorse Publishing.