2021-2022

Anchorage Daily News

The Anchorage Daily News is the most-read newspaper and news site in Alaska. In 2017, the organization was purchased by an Alaska family with an interest in keeping the newspaper alive. The business turned around—by controlling costs, growing revenue, with a continued shift online, and especially, continued newsroom transformation that has emphasized producing quality journalism, serving audiences where they are, and adapting to changing platforms and reader habits and needs. Partnerships of all kinds have become critical for us.

Akron Beacon Journal

The Akron Beacon Journal provides comprehensive news coverage primarily for Summit and Stark counties in post-industrial Northeast Ohio. We frequently publish deep-dive enterprise reports on a wide variety of topics. These newsroom also leads the joint news efforts of GateHouse Media in Northeast Ohio, which includes numerous other daily media sites and weekly publications. Overall, GateHouse serves 10 counties in Northeast Ohio and a population of 1.2 million residents. We also work closely with GateHouse’s Columbus Dispatch for Statehouse and regional news coverage.

100 Days in Appalachia

100 Days in Appalachia is a digital news publication born the day after the 2016 election in response to the national narrative that reduced our region to a handful of narrow stories. Our mission is to share the diverse stories of the 13 states that make up this region, which stretches from the Rust Belt to the Black Belt, by working with local voices to apply a cultural lens to what’s happening in our backyards and share what that means for the rest of the world.

Zachary Podmore

Zak is a journalist and film producer who has covered rural Utah politics, public lands and conservation issues for Outside Online, Sierra, Four Corners Free Press, Canoe & Kayak and the Huffington Post. In early 2019, he revived a local newspaper in southeast Utah, the Canyon Echo, which he edits. His writing has received awards from the Society of Professional Journalists’ Colorado chapter and Folio magazine. Zak has worked as a river ranger in Bears Ears National Monument in Utah. He has an M.F.A. in environmental nonfiction writing, and has written a book, “Confluence: Navigating the Personal and Political On Rivers of the New West.” Zak has lived in Utah’s San Juan County since 2015.

Wyatt Massey

Wyatt has covered religion, immigration and social services for the Frederick News-Post in Maryland. There and as a freelance writer, he has covered stories ranging from childhood malnutrition in Haiti to gentrification in Brooklyn to faith in rural Kansas to heroin and opioid addiction in Milwaukee. Massey was an O’Hare Fellow at America, a respected national Catholic magazine. As an intern at The Baltimore Sun, he covered crime, along with researching for and helping craft Justin George’s yearlong “Shoot to Kill” investigation of US gun homicide trends. Wyatt grew up on a family farm in Hollandale, Wisconsin and majored in English at Marquette University.

Victor L. Rodriguez-Velazquez

Victor has been a journalism professor and freelance reporter in Puerto Rico. He started his career at the Metro Puerto Rico, where he covered business, the economy and entrepreneurship. When he joined Universidad Ana G. Méndez & Universidad del Sagrado Corazón as a professor—teaching journalism, communication theory, and multimedia production—he also took over as acting director of Diálogo UPR, the official newspaper of the University of Puerto Rico. In this role, he coordinated and supervised editorial projects and was responsible for increasing audience across digital platforms. More recently, he has worked as a freelance investigative reporter for Centro de Periodismo Investigativo de Puerto Rico. Victor earned a B.A. in journalism and M.A. in communications from the University of Puerto Rico.  

Samantha Hogan

Samantha covered the statehouse, environment, and agriculture at The Frederick News-Post in Maryland. Her work has been recognized by the Maryland, Delaware and District of Columbia Press Association, including First Place for breaking news; First and Second Place for her pieces on growth and land use; First and Second Place for her environmental reporting. She is a former Washington Post intern, where she worked for the investigative and metro desks, and she is a graduate of American University, where she earned an M.A. in investigative reporting.

Rafael René Díaz Torres

Rafael has been a freelance journalist and geography professor at the University of Puerto Rico, where he specializes in the intersection of local sports, media and society. He has worked as a news and sports reporter for The Puerto Rico Daily Sun, NotiCel.com, 80 Grados and Diálogo UPR. In 2018, he joined the team of Todas PR, a feminist newspaper founded by Puerto Rican female journalists. He received his B.A. from University of Puerto Rico and two masters degrees in geography, mass media and women’s studies at Penn State, where he was president of the Puerto Rican Graduate Student Association. He is currently ABD in History and Caribbean Studies at the Center of Advanced Studies of Puerto Rico and the Caribbean. He is the editor of a multidisciplinary academic journal at the University of Puerto Rico.

Phoebe Petrovic

Phoebe is a radio journalist whose work has aired on “Reveal,” NPR’s “Morning Edition” and “Here & Now.” In the past year, she served as a general assignment reporter at Wisconsin Public Radio through the Lee Ester News Fellowship and editorial radio intern at “Reveal,” where she helped cover family separation and other immigration stories. She earned her B.A. from Yale University, where she founded and led audio projects including Herald Audio, the first-ever audio section of an undergraduate publication, and “Small-Great Objects,” the first-ever podcast series installed at Yale University Art Gallery.

Lauren Lindstrom

Lauren has been a reporter at The Blade in Toledo for nearly five years, most recently on the health beat covering everything from Ohio’s heroin and opioid epidemic to Toledo’s efforts to reduce childhood lead poisoning. Her work has won several state and local awards for investigation and breaking news, including the Press Club of Toledo’s 2017 Touchstone Award for a series examining the lack of local oversight on homes with unsafe lead levels. Originally from Wisconsin, she interned at the Green Bay Press Gazette and Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. Lauren majored in journalism with a minor in Spanish at Northwestern University, where she was news editor for North by Northwestern, an independent student magazine.