WRITING

Hadley Hitson

Hadley Hitson covers the rural South and the Black Belt communities in Alabama for the Montgomery Advertiser, a daily newspaper in the state capital. Hadley previously worked as a freelance education reporter for Fortune magazine, while the media outlet launched its first annual list of the Best Online MBA Programs. As a Fortune editorial intern, she authored articles on the technology, business, and politics beats. Hadley is a graduate of the University of Mississippi, where she was the managing editor of the university’s award-winning, student-run newspaper, The Daily Mississippian. She has also interviewed a member of the presidential Cabinet, covered the relocation of a 114-year-old Confederate monument, and appeared on the The Paul Finebaum Show for the SEC Network.

Kaitlin Cough

Kate Cough covers energy and the environment for The Maine Monitor, an investigative outlet based in Maine, where she was born and raised. She was previously a reporter and then the digital media strategist for The Ellsworth American, a 150-year-old weekly paper based in Ellsworth, Maine. While there, she won awards from the Maine Press Association and the New England Newspaper Association for her work on where local recycling really winds up, how businesses are coping with the labor shortage, and a local network of white supremacists, among other pieces. Kate graduated with honors from Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism and Magna Cum Laude from Bryn Mawr College, and spent time in medical school before leaving to pursue her dream of becoming a journalist.

Traverse City Record-Eagle

The Traverse City Record-Eagle is northern Michigan's largest news outlet, operating print and digital publications, including a daily print edition, a quarterly magazine and two podcasts. The Record-Eagle has a strong history of strong watchdog reporting complemented by artful narrative writing. Our newsroom is situated in downtown Traverse City, but serves a five-county core coverage area as well as broad, growing sections of news desert in northern Michigan.  

The Baltimore Sun

The Baltimore Sun, founded in 1837, is the largest daily newspaper in Maryland, with a coverage area that includes Baltimore City and five surrounding counties. Much of The Sun’s journalism has exposed corruption and sparked changes, including the resignation of the city’s mayor this year. At the same time, we surface powerful, often under-the-radar tales and trend pieces, like the struggle of refugees in a Baltimore high school, or how the century-long history of a vacant house—which collapsed and killed a man—told the story of our city.

Bennito Kelty

Bennito Kelty covers the IDEA beat, taking a close look at inclusivity, diversity, equity and access for the Tucson Sentinel, a nonprofit news site in Tucson, Arizona. Before this, he worked for the Yuma Sun in Yuma, Arizona reporting on the Arizona-Mexico border and county government. Kelty calls Aurora, Colorado home and its diverse immigrant community led him to become interested in understanding cultures from around the world that exist in America and how these groups of people live together. That interest, plus growing up in a Mexican American home, influenced his love of languages, including his own native Spanish and English. Kelty started reporting as a journalism student at the University of Missouri, where he won recognition from the Missouri Press Association for a story in the Missourian, the school’s community paper. Kelty has also won an award with The St. Louis American for breaking news coverage.

Alixel Cabrera

Alixel Cabrera covers government accountability in West Valley City for The Salt Lake Tribune, a nonprofit newspaper in Salt Lake City, Utah. Cabrera is a Venezuelan journalist who has reported on the economy, energy, food and culture for newspapers and websites in Venezuela and the U.S., including The Salt Lake Tribune and Rest of World, an international nonprofit journalism organization. She has also reported for La Verdad and Cronica Uno, where she covered Maracaibo, her hometown and one of the cities most affected by blackouts and food shortages in Venezuela. Cabrera earned her master's degree at the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism in 2020. She was a Maria Moors Cabot scholar and the recipient of a Jack R. Howard fellowship in international journalism.

Charlie McGee

Charlie McGee reports on local government accountability and environmental issues for the Desert Dispatch in Barstow, California. Previously, McGee's investigative work has detailed Hurricane Florence's aftermath in an impoverished coastal town, for VICE; and sparked a criminal investigation by uncovering an illegal PAC in North Carolina for The Daily Tar Heel, the student paper of The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and Indy Week. McGee has written for Bloomberg News and The Wall Street Journal, and his investigative work on corporate titans in the coronavirus era is a soon-to-come book. He won multiple awards as a reporter at The Daily Tar Heel, including second place in the Associated Collegiate Press's 2020 Reporter of the Year competition for a series that prompted a judge to reverse a $2.5 million deal between UNC-Chapel Hill and the Sons of Confederate Veterans. He grew up in Huntersville, North Carolina.

Jasmin Herrera

Jasmin Herrera reports on affordable housing in Charlotte, North Carolina for La Noticia, the state’s largest Spanish-language paper. Herrera is a trilingual Mexican American journalist born in California and raised in North Carolina. She earned an associate degree at Central Piedmont Community College and holds a bachelor’s in media and journalism with a minor in social and economic justice from The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. As part of a multimedia team project covering the aftermath of Hurricane Maria and its devastating effects on Puerto Rico and its people, Herrera reported on the island’s fallen electrical grid and helped the team win the Online Journalism Awards’ top honor for student journalism in 2018 and earn second place in the Society of Environmental Journalists’ student awards. The judges deemed this multimedia project “a superior example of the potential of modern journalism.” Herrera has also interned with her local NPR affiliate and Creative Loafing Charlotte.

Maria Benevento

Maria Benevento covers education for The Kansas City Beacon, a nonprofit newsroom focused on in-depth public service journalism. Prior to joining The Beacon, she reported on the Missouri state government as an intern for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch Jefferson City bureau. While earning her master's at the University of Missouri School of Journalism, Benevento worked on the education and state government beats, the graphics desk, and as a teaching assistant on the copy desk for the Columbia Missourian, the school's community paper. Benevento's investigative work for the paper focused on the struggles domestic violence victims face while trying to divorce their abusers. She spent two years as an editorial intern at the National Catholic Reporter in Kansas City before heading off to graduate school. Home for Benevento is Kirksville, Missouri.

Rebecca Najera

Rebecca Najera covers race and equity for Oklahoma Watch, a nonprofit investigative news organization based in Oklahoma City. Najera graduated with a master’s degree in journalism from the University of North Texas in 2021, where she was a Mayborn Scholar and editor-in-chief of the North Texas Daily, the student paper. As an undergraduate at UNT, she reported and edited for the Daily, and prior to that she earned her associate degree at Tyler Junior College, where she was editor-in-chief of The DrumBeat, the student publication. Najera’s writing and photography have earned her awards from the Texas Intercollegiate Press Association. Home for Najera is New London, Texas.