Texas

Victoria Advocate

The Victoria Advocate is 175 years old, and the second oldest daily paper in Texas. This family-owned community paper and news site is committed to reporting daily news, features, and hard-hitting investigations, holding officials accountable.

Patrick Sloan-Turner

Patrick Sloan-Turner covers education in Victoria, Texas, and its surrounding communities for the Victoria Advocate, the second oldest paper in the Lone Star State. Prior to joining the Advocate, Sloan-Turner covered university governance at DePaul University in Chicago, Illinois for the school’s student-run independent newspaper, The DePaulia. There, he also covered topics like Chicago politics, crime, healthcare and others, while serving as the outlet’s Online Managing Editor. Prior to his pursuit of a bachelor’s in journalism at DePaul, Sloan-Turner worked as a stringer at his hometown newspaper, the Lansing State Journal in Lansing, Michigan. It was there that he was first inspired to become a journalist after witnessing the Journal’s impressive coverage of the Larry Nassar scandal at Michigan State University.

Joy Ashford

Joy Ashford covers faith and religion in North Texas for The Dallas Morning News. Prior to joining The Dallas Morning News, Joy worked as a co-op for The Boston Globe and interned with Washington Monthly, The Delaware News Journal, and Philadelphia Magazine. Joy majored in Social Studies at Harvard University and wrote a senior thesis on religious liberty and evolving interpretations of the First Amendment. They also served as an executive editor, Arts Chair, and magazine staff writer for their student newspaper, The Harvard Crimson. In 2023, Joy was named a finalist for the Society of Professional Journalists’ cultural criticism award for their arts criticism at The Boston Globe. Outside of work, Joy loves dancing, camping, and getting lost in a good TV show.

Longview News-Journal

The Longview News-Journal is part of third-generation, family-owned community newspaper and multimedia news organization. We are committed to digital-first community journalism—not just reporting the news, but also holding officials accountable for their actions. We work to keep the public informed of the news through our print and digital platforms. We strive to be fair, accurate and respectful while reporting the news, from hard-hitting investigations to the daily news and features. Our goal is to use all available journalism tools in the service of reporting on, and bettering, our community.

Tannistha Sinha

Tannistha Sinha covers politics in Houston for the Houston Defender Network. She graduated with a master's of science in journalism from the University of Southern California last year, and was the recipient of the Annenberg Graduate fellowship. While pursuing stories for the curriculum, she also served as a reporter and USC editor at the student-led newsroom Annenberg Media, and interned at the inequality desk of BuzzFeed News, where she focused on socioeconomic stories. After graduating, she joined HousingWire Media as a general assignment reporter, where she covered housing and real estate trends across the country, and concentrated on affordable housing and propTech. She grew up in Kolkata, India, and completed her undergraduate and graduate studies in English literature from Jadavpur University. Being an avid debater, she represented her university in several public speaking competitions across India. Her works have also been published by notable Indian newsrooms like The Hindu, The Telegraph, CNN News18, NDTV and The Wire.

Avery Martinez

Avery Martinez is the mental health reporter for KVIA-TV in the Borderland around El Paso, Texas. While currently working in TV, Martinez also has experience in print and radio. Previous roles have included interim editor and producer/anchor in different media. He cut his teeth in smaller family newspapers, before working for major syndicates and networks. He brings a community approach to reporting. Martinez has been a legal staff writer, immigration specialist, campaign correspondent and columnist—in addition to covering city, state and federal courts and legislatures. He was the first graduate of Fort Lewis College's Journalism and Mass Media Studies program. Martinez has won awards and recognition for his coverage of election committees, immigrant legal representation and the future of law school exams.

Carlos Nogueras

Carlos Nogueras reports on the vast Permian Basin region in West Texas for the Texas Tribune, writing about the hundreds of thousands of people who shoulder the impacts of an extraction-based economy in the oil and gas capital of the country. Before relocating to Texas, Nogueras was a political reporting fellow for Al Día News in Philadelphia, a bilingual digital paper and magazine covering Latino politics, its dynamics, power players and the policy shaping the Hispanic community. Nogueras has written extensively about Latino lawmakers—their stances versus their words, promises on the campaign trail and how they helped define municipal local politics. In Puerto Rico, where Nogueras was born and raised, he was a freelancer writing about the unpaid labor behind motherhood during the pandemic, gun violence and the waning coffee industry. He earned his bachelor's degree in music from Berklee College of Music in Boston and began his master's degree in journalism at the University of Puerto Rico.

Jordan Green

Jordan Green covers the rural beat for the Longview News-Journal in Longview, Texas. He interned at The Saturday Evening Post magazine in 2022, writing about Midwest culture. He interned in 2020 and 2021 at The Oklahoman in Oklahoma City, where he covered general news, breaking news and the coronavirus pandemic, among other topics. He began his journalism career as a high school sophomore in 2017 at his hometown weekly newspaper, The Blackwell (Okla.) Journal-Tribune. He graduated from Northwestern Oklahoma State University in 2023, where he served as editor-in-chief of the campus paper.

Marissa Greene

Marissa Greene covers faith and religion in Tarrant County, Texas, for the Fort Worth Report. Previously, Greene was an audience fellow for The Texas Tribune, where she wrote an explanatory article about the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals and produced Instagram and Twitter posts ahead of the state’s midterm elections. Greene got her start in journalism at Austin Community College, where she spearheaded the college’s student media organization. She reported how Winter Storm Uri underscored power concerns for an Asian American community as an Austin PBS intern. Her love for local reporting led her to internships with Austin and Dallas NPR member stations. She's a graduate of the University of Texas at Austin, and has been the co-host and a producer of “Hi, How Are You?” a music and mental health podcast.

Michaela Rush

Michaela Rush covers the south and west neighborhoods of Dallas for the Dallas Free Press, a nonprofit news organization. Prior to joining RFA and DFP, Rush worked at The Battalion student newspaper at Texas A&M, most recently as the editor-in-chief, covering campus news, local businesses, student organizations and LGBTQ+ topics. Rush will graduate in May 2023 with a degree in English and minor in Spanish. Outside of journalism, she plays several instruments, and is a self-proclaimed "band nerd."