RADIO / PODCAST

Sara Ernst

Sara Willa Ernst reports for Houston Public Media, where she covers health disparities related to factors including income that affect Houston communities. Ernst was a Reporting Fellow at New Hampshire Public Radio, working both in daily news and long-form podcasting. During her time there, she was a producer for the podcasts The Second Greatest Show On Earth and Outside/In. She co-reported a two-part podcast on sex education in New Hampshire, covering topics from the statewide curriculum, abstinence-based education, LGBTQ inclusivity, consent and more. Before working on the podcast team, she was a General Assignment Reporter in the NHPR newsroom, covering the charter school debate embroiling the Granite State and the 2020 New Hampshire Presidential Primary. After graduating from Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Ernst interned for NPR in Washington D.C. She previously held internships at Nashville Public Radio and WBUR Boston. She was a Chips Quinn Scholar in 2018 and is a member of the Asian American Journalists Association.

Megan Zerez

Megan Zerez reports on education for WSKG, an NPR affiliate station in Binghamton, New York. In 2021, she earned her degree from The Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism. Zerez has interned with WNYC public radio and has written for The City, a nonprofit news site. She grew up in Honolulu and before she was a reporter, Zerez was a researcher in a bioengineering lab. But when ongoing nationwide protests in South Africa disrupted her work there, she began to record interviews and document clashes with police, and later realized that journalism was for her. That realization led to an internship at KERA, Dallas’ NPR station, where her story on refugees won statewide recognition. Zerez wrote an investigative series on alleged sexual harassment and labor law violations by a major university contractor for The Mercury, the student paper at the University of Texas at Dallas. Her work earned her honors from the Society of Professional Journalists.

WSKG Public Telecommunications Council

WSKG is a public radio station serving the Binghamton, N.Y., area with educational programming and news. Its areas of focus include the arts, culture and heritage of the region as well as other matters of local importance. It is an affiliate of National Public Radio. The station seeks to represent diverse viewpoints to help listeners reach better conclusions that can be clearly explained, effectively defended or, when appropriate, revisited and revised.

Gracyn Doctor

Gracyn Doctor covers race and equity for WFAE, an NPR member station in Charlotte, North Carolina. She earned her master's degree in arts journalism from Syracuse University in 2020, where she reported on health and policy change as an intern at WAER, the public radio station on campus. Doctor also wrote for The NewsHouse, a student-run news site, and Syracuse.com and hosted and produced a podcast on news and Black culture. For her capstone project at American Theatre magazine, she reported on the state of theatre at the height of the pandemic, focusing on the pandemic's effect on theatre companies of color. Originally from Charleston, South Carolina, Doctor says her goal is to create equal and better coverage of the Black and LGBTQIA communities, and to be an honest, trustworthy voice in the media.

Katie Hyson

Katie Hyson reports on racial justice for WUFT News, a public media newsroom in Gainesville, Florida. Before her Report for America position, Hyson worked as a supervising editor of digital content for WUFT. In 2020, she graduated from the professional master's program in mass communications at the University of Florida. Hyson focused on audio, visual and written narratives, resulting in her report on the first openly transgender person to run for the Florida Senate, and a story that focused on one woman in the months leading up to the closure of her homeless camp. Hyson, of Lutz, Florida, is obsessed with the powerful overlap of creative storytelling, rigorous journalism and multimedia. To that end, she developed and launched a two-course practicum in digital production and taught multimedia reporting at the University of Florida. When there's not a global pandemic, you can catch her telling stories onstage.

Katrina Pross

Katrina Pross covers criminal justice for WFYI Public Media, Indiana's chief PBS and NPR member station, based in Indianapolis. Pross grew up in Eagan, Minnesota and has reported on the courts and criminal justice for the St. Paul Pioneer Press, including the trial of Derek Chauvin for the death of George Floyd—she was one of the select pool reporters rotating inside the courtroom. Pross has also reported on criminal justice reform and COVID-19 outbreaks in Minnesota prisons. She double majored in journalism and French at the University of Minnesota, where she was a reporter and editor at the school's paper, The Minnesota Daily. Pross has interned at APM Reports, the Star Tribune, and a radio station in France during a study-abroad program. She graduated in 2020, and was named the Daily's Editor of the Year.

Kyra Miles

Kyra Miles is an education reporter for WBHM, the listener-supported station of the University of Alabama in Birmingham. This radio reporter from Greenville, North Carolina has a passion for telling stories that uplift diverse communities. As a student at The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Miles was a reporter and producer for Carolina Connection, the radio newscast created by students in the UNC Hussman School of Journalism and Media. Notably, one program she worked on received the 2020 Student Edward R. Murrow Award for excellence in audio newscast. A multimedia journalist, Miles covered arts and culture for The Daily Tar Heel, the student paper at UNC, and interned at a news website for faculty and staff. Miles graduated with a bachelor's degree in broadcast journalism in 2021.

Maria Ramirez Uribe

Maria Ramirez Uribe is a bilingual journalist covering the Latino community in Charlotte, North Carolina for WFAE, an NPR member station, and La Noticia, the state's biggest Spanish-language paper. Before starting her Report for America position, Ramirez spent a year reporting on the economic impact of COVID-19 on Charlotte's Latino community for WFAE. She was born in Caracas, Venezuela to Colombian parents and raised in Maryland. Ramirez has worked as a freelance researcher for CNN's international desk, where she previously interned, helping the network's coverage of international breaking news. Ramirez graduated from North Carolina's Elon University with a double major in journalism and strategic communications.

Alexa Krupp

Lexi Krupp covers Science and Health for Vermont Public Radio, with a focus on the challenges and opportunities in rural communities. She also contributes to coverage of statewide issues. Krupp was a science reporter for Interlochen Public Radio in northern Michigan, where she produced a podcast about the land, water and inhabitants of the upper Great Lakes' area. Her work has appeared on All Things Considered, and as a freelancer, in Audubon, Popular Science, Science Vs, VICE, and Medscape. Krupp was a teacher and once spent a summer tracking mountain goats for the U.S. Forest Service. She holds a master's degree in journalism from New York University and a bachelor's in biology from Dartmouth College.

Nirvani Williams

Nirvani Williams covers socio-economic disparities in western Massachusetts for New England Public Media, a nonprofit multimedia organization based in Springfield, Massachusetts. Prior to this, Williams was the associate editor of Seema, an online publication dedicated to spreading more stories about women in the Indian diaspora, and has written a variety of articles, including a story about a Bangladeshi American cybersecurity expert and her tips for protecting phone data while protesting. Williams interned at WABC-TV's “Eyewitness News,” WSHU public radio, and La Voce di New York, a news site in Italian and English. She holds a bachelor's degree in journalism from Stony Brook University, where she was the executive editor of the student-run culture magazine, The Stony Brook Press. Williams hopes to inspire with her writing and to continue reporting on systemic and institutional inequalities in underserved communities.