WRITING

Rafael Garcia

Rafael Garcia is a journalist for The Wichita Beacon, a nonprofit digital news organization in Wichita, Kansas. He covers local and state education issues, and hopes to focus on the future of education as the state rebounds from the pandemic. Prior to working at The Beacon, Garcia reported on K-12 and higher education for The Topeka Capital-Journal and The Manhattan Mercury in Kansas. His stories on equity-and-access issues, declining enrollment and educator shortages have been published across Gannett Kansas' network of papers. A Kansas native, Garcia's love of donuts helped him win a first place award from the Kansas Press Association for a feature he wrote about an estate sale at the site of a donut shop that closed long ago, but is filled with memories. A first-generation college graduate, Garcia was three-time editor-in-chief of The Kansas State Collegian at Kansas State University.

Tran Nguyen

Tran Nguyen reports for the San Jose Spotlight, a nonprofit, community-supported digital news organization in California. A bilingual data journalist, Nguyen covers the Vietnamese community and other news in the South Bay. Before starting the Report for America position, she interned for Spotlight, where she reported on businesses, schools, city and county government. While pursuing her master's degree in data journalism at the University of Missouri, Nguyen worked as a K-12 education and graphics reporter for the Columbia Missourian, the student-run publication, and as a graduate research assistant studying the user experience of digital versus print journalism. Nguyen was a city hall reporter for the Ashland Tidings and the Mail Tribune in Oregon, and she also holds a bachelor's degree in journalism from the University of Oregon. Her hometown is Saigon, Vietnam.

Catherine Nolte

Catherine Nolte reports on poverty and food insecurity in Fort Smith, Arkansas for the Southwest Times Record. In 2021, she earned her bachelor's degree in communication from John Brown University in Siloam Springs, Arkansas. Nolte was the executive editor of The Threefold Advocate, the student paper, and during her tenure she led the paper to a fully digital transition while covering breaking news, the university's response to COVID-19 and the effects of online harassment on campus culture and student safety. Nolte's work and leadership earned her the Editor of the Year Award from the Arkansas College Media Association, and she has also won multiple first-place awards from the National Federation of Press Women. She grew up in Benton, Arkansas.

Ian Karbal

Ian Karbal reports on state politics for Mountain State Spotlight, an investigative and enterprise news site based in Charleston, West Virginia. Before joining the Spotlight, Karbal was a Delacorte Magazine fellow at the Columbia Journalism Review, covering mis/disinformation and the media industry. He holds a master's degree from the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism, where he specialized in investigative reporting in the Toni Stabile Center program. His work has also appeared in The Trace, OpenSecrets, and the Gateway Journalism Review. Karbal, from Chicago, began his career reporting on local government for the Pinckneyville Press in Illinois. His investigative work uncovering biased and for-profit policing practices earned him a Freedom of Information Award from the National Newspaper Association, and made him a finalist for the 2018 Chicago Headline Club's Peter Lisagor Awards.

Madeline Thigpen

Madeline Thigpen covers education for The Atlanta Voice in Georgia. As an independent journalist, she has reported on the school district in her hometown of South Orange, New Jersey. Her coverage tackled the district's elementary school integration plan and its struggle to reopen schools during the pandemic. She has written about parents groups that demanded that schools be reopened, and the teacher's union that undertook multiple job actions to ensure safe working conditions. Thigpen has also provided local news coverage in Elizabeth, New Jersey, writing about the city's large community of domestic workers and the intersection of labor and immigration rights that affects their community. She interned at “The Brian Lehrer Show,” a daily call-in program on WNYC, New York's leading public radio station, and for four years hosted a show on WVAU, American University's student-run radio station.

Rebecca Griesbach

Rebecca Griesbach covers the educational opportunity gap in Birmingham, Alabama, for AL.com, which reports on Alabama news. Prior to joining AL, Griesbach tracked and reported on COVID-19 cases in correctional facilities for The New York Times, and gathered election data for OpenElections.net. Her journalism career started when she joined her high school newspaper as a hopeful comics artist in the 10th grade. There, she worked with ProPublica journalists to tell the story of school segregation in her hometown of Tuscaloosa. As a college intern for Chalkbeat, Griesbach covered education history, equity and access across Alabama and in Memphis. She holds a master's degree in gender and race studies from The University of Alabama, where she earned her bachelor's in journalism and was editor-in-chief of The Crimson White, the student newspaper.

Vanessa Colon Almenas

Vanessa Colon Almenas helps lead a team of reporters for the Centro de Periodismo Investigativo (CPI), a nonprofit investigative news organization. Colon Almenas, who was born and raised in Puerto Rico, and her team are delving into the island's recovery efforts following Hurricane Maria in 2017. With more than 25 years of journalism experience, she has worked as a reporter, a deputy director and a multimedia editor at Primera Hora, a newspaper. Later, she was the digital deputy director of Puerto Rico's two largest news sites, El Nuevo Dia and Primera Hora. Colon Almenas recently completed her master's at the Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism at the City University of New York. As an independent journalist her work has been published by the CPI, City Limits, Latino Rebels and CNN en Español.

Alex Driehaus

Alex Driehaus is a photojournalist for the Valley News in West Lebanon, New Hampshire. Previously, Driehaus worked at the Naples Daily News in Naples, Florida, where she covered community stories, including migrant students facing education challenges during the pandemic and python hunters in the Everglades. Before moving to the Sunshine State, she interned at The Virginian-Pilot, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, and The Patriot-News. Driehaus enjoys working in situations where she is able to spend time getting to know the people she photographs and exploring their lives and relationships visually. Driehaus grew up in Cincinnati, and is a graduate of Ohio University's School of Visual Communication. Her photography earned her a spot at The Eddie Adams Workshop in 2019.

Celia Hack

Celia Hack reports on local government for The Wichita Beacon, a nonprofit news site in Wichita, Kansas. Prior to this, she interned for EcoRI News in Providence, Rhode Island, covering local government and environmental issues. Hack earned a bachelor’s degree from Brown University in 2021, where she worked as a reporter and section editor for The Brown Daily Herald. Her outstanding accomplishments earned her a second place award from the university honoring excellence in journalism. Hack is from Westwood, Kansas and has covered local government, criminal justice and education as a freelancer for the Shawnee Mission Post and for The Journal, a publication of the Kansas Leadership Center, a nonprofit in Wichita. As a research assistant, Hack has worked for Global Energy Monitor, a nonprofit collecting data on worldwide fossil fuel projects, and for the Climate and Development Lab, a think tank researching climate policy and politics.

Jacob Steimer

Jacob Steimer reports on poverty, power and public policy for MLK50: Justice Through Journalism, a nonprofit digital newsroom in Memphis, Tennessee. Before this, Steimer reported for the Memphis Business Journal for more than four years, regularly scooping the competition. He says that his best stories included an investigation into a low income housing program and an in-depth look at why so few Memphis commercial real estate agents are Black, why that matters and how it could change. While studying journalism and economics at the University of Missouri, he was a reporter and editor for the Columbia Missourian, the school’s community paper, and earned awards from the Missouri Press Association. Steimer has interned at The Charlotte Observer and WVLT-TV in Knoxville, Tennessee. An avid sports fan and a history enthusiast, he grew up in Knoxville, Tennessee.