Tennessee

MLK50: Justice Through Journalism

MLK50: Justice Through Journalism is an award-winning nonprofit digital newsroom, and focused on the intersection of poverty, power and policy. Its vision echoes Dr. Martin Luther King’s dream: a nation where all residents, especially workers, have enough resources to thrive, and where public and private policy supports their success.

Institute for Public Service Reporting at the University of Memphis

The Institute for Public Service Reporting is a nonprofit newsroom on the campus of the University of Memphis specializing in investigative reporting and in-depth explanatory journalism—an arm of the university with a firewall protecting their editorial independence. Its mission is to provide robust, civic-minded journalism that promotes a vibrant democracy, fosters inclusiveness and enriches the lives of the people of greater Memphis, including many underserved communities. Stories appear on its news site, and often in other publications as well.

Kingsport Times News

The Kingsport Times News serves readers in Eastern Tennessee and Southwest Virginia with comprehensive local coverage, from breaking news to community events. Committed to journalistic integrity, it delivers the stories that matter most to its readers. As part of a family-owned group of five regional newspapers, the Times News collaborates with its sister publications to provide shared content across print and digital platforms, ensuring timely and reliable news for the communities it proudly serves.

Nashville Banner

The new Nashville Banner is a locally owned, community-supported nonprofit news organization that exists as a direct response to the decline of public service journalism in Tennessee. We’re on a mission to tell people something they didn’t already know, and to help them understand what’s at stake for the present and future of our ever-changing city. We deliver daily news that inspires our neighbors to act with agency.

F. Amanda Tugade

F. Amanda Tugade reports for MLK50: Justice Through Journalism, which is based in Memphis, Tennessee. She focuses on poverty, power and public policy in Memphis and Shelby County. Previously, Tugade has covered Chicago and its surrounding suburbs. She has primarily worked as a reporter for local media outlets, including Shaw Media, the former 22nd Century Media and the Chicago Tribune/Pioneer Press newspapers. Her stories have also been featured in the Chicago Reader, Chicago Magazine, the Chicago Defender. She has won awards from the Northern Illinois Newspaper Association and the Illinois Press Association for her in-depth profiles of community leaders. Recently, Tugade was named a 2019 Peter Lisagor Award finalist. She’s a graduate of the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign.
Cassandra Stephenson

Cassandra Stephenson

Cassandra Stephenson covers issues impacting rural West Tennessee for The Tennessee Lookout. Prior to joining The Tennessee Lookout, Cassandra covered Metro Nashville government at The Tennessean for nearly three years, chronicling the consequences of policy decisions for residents in one of the fastest-growing cities in the nation. Cassandra's post-collegiate reporting career began in West Tennessee in 2018 when she moved from her hometown in Ventura County, California after graduating from Pepperdine University with a bachelor’s degree in journalism. There, she reported on breaking news and justice for a 13-county region, publishing award-winning investigations on local physicians’ involvement in the opioid epidemic and conditions in local for-profit prisons. Cassandra joined The Tennessean as a business reporter in 2020, covering pandemic-related business challenges including unemployment, workplace safety and eviction. Outside of the newsroom, you'll find Cassandra immersed in her latest art project or baking endeavor.  

Rebecca E.J. Cadenhead

Rebecca E.J. Cadenhead covers youth and juvenile justice for MLK50. Cadenhead graduated from Harvard University in 2023, where she studied Philosophy and African American Studies. Cadenhead has served as a Puffin Fellow at The Nation and a Ledecky Fellow at Harvard Magazine. She has also held several editing positions, including Associate Editor at The Harvard Crimson and Features Editor at the Harvard Advocate. Her work, which spans long-form journalism and narrative nonfiction, has been awarded a 2023 CASE Award and a 2022 Pushcart Prize.

MLK50: Justice Through Journalism

MLK50: Justice Through Journalism is an award-winning nonprofit digital newsroom, and focused on the intersection of poverty, power and policy. Its vision echoes Dr. Martin Luther King’s dream: a nation where all residents, especially workers, have enough resources to thrive, and where public and private policy supports their success.

Tennessee Lookout

The Tennessee Lookout is a nonprofit, nonpartisan watchdog news organization dedicated to telling the stories of politics and policy that affect the people of the Volunteer State. We expose the relationships between politics, people and policy and we hold the powerful accountable.

Brittany Brown

Brittany Brown covers workers and labor in Memphis, Tennessee for MLK50: Justice Through Journalism, which reports on policy, poverty and power in Memphis and Shelby County. Prior to joining MLK50, Brown reported on the criminal justice system in Mississippi, Alabama and Louisiana for the Gulf States Newsroom, NPR’s southern news hub. She was the inaugural Emerging Reporters Fellow at Mississippi Today, where she covered the state’s criminal legal system through the lens of justice and equity. Brown’s journalism career began in student media at the University of Mississippi, where she worked as a reporter and editor for the student newspaper, tv station and yearbook. In college she worked as a breaking news intern with The Baltimore Sun and was a reporting fellow with Carnegie-Knight News21 at Arizona State University, where she reported on hate crimes in America. Brown holds a bachelor’s degree in journalism and is currently completing her master’s documentary thesis project in Southern Studies at the University of Mississippi.