The Journalism Salute

On this episode we're joined by Stacy Kess . Stacy is a journalist and the founder and head of editorial for Equal Access Public Media . She's a graduate of Indiana University and is based in Boston. The mission of Equal Access Public Media is to make news more accessible to all audiences so that it is more inclusive of those with disabilities, chronic illnesses, and others with accessibil...

On this episode we're joined by David Covucci . David is the editor-in-chief of FOIAball – FOIA standing for "Freedom of Information Act." It's a newsletter that uses public records reporting to investigate college football. As he said- collectives, consultants, cops, contracts, and communications. Whether or not you like sports, I think you'll find this conversation informativ...

On this episode we're joined by Sam Donndelinger. Sam is an investigative journalist and lead designer for Uncloseted Media. Uncloseted Media is a non-profit newsroom started by NYU professor Spencer MacNaughton to do investigative reporting on LGBTQ issues. It has 4 full-time employees and well-followed Instagram , Facebook , and TikTok accounts. Sam has won multiple awards for her reporting....

On this episode we're joined by Ben Chase . Ben is a two-time guest. We talked to him in 2021 when he was a reporter for the Huron Daily Plainsman in Huron, South Dakota (population ~14,000, one-third of which is Hispanic or Asian). Now he's the paper's managing editor, a role he's held for roughly a year … and it's been quite a year as he’ll share. The paper was shut down (bri...

On this episode we're joined by Jules Roscoe . Jules is an independent journalist (freelance writer) who covers labor and technology from a national perspective and politics from a local perspective. Jules has written for (among other places), 404 Media , The Boston Guardian , Vice , Wired , and Matter News , is a 2024 graduate of NYU, and works full-time as a legal proofreader. We talked abou...

On this episode we're joined by Megan Tagami . Megan is a reporter covering education for Honolulu Civil Beat , a non-profit newsroom in Hawaii. She's a native of Honolulu and a 2023 graduate of UCLA with a degree in political science and government.  Megan talked about her entry into journalism, how she overcame her hesitance to ask people questions, explained her writing process, and sha...

On this episode we're joined by Alyssa Rosenberg . Alyssa is a former editor and columnist for The Washington Post . She was at the Post for 11 and a half years, the last year and a half was spent as the letters and community editor. After the Post declined to endorse a candidate in the 2024 presidential election she invited readers to write in. The result was 21,000 letters. And over a 6-mont...

On The Journalism Salute we talk to journalists about who they are and what they do with the intent of showing that journalists are not the enemy of the people. On this episode we're joined by Babette Hogan and Julie Eisenberg . They are the filmmakers behind Running for the Mountains , a new documentary film about environmental policies and politics and the fight between activists and politic...

On this episode we're joined by A'lauren Gilchrist . A'lauren is a senior at Norfolk State University, an HBCU in Norfolk, Virginia. She is also the student representative at the National Association of Black Journalists, NABJ . A'lauren's experience includes an internship with WAVY 10 News and we talked about the different things she learned, including the importance of having...

On this episode we're joined by Maryam Jameel. Maryam is a graduate of Northwestern and an engagement reporter for ProPublica focused on workers' rights, occupational safety, immigration, and the federal government. Being an engagement reporter means both connecting with your audience and connecting with sources and Marayam is working on a campaign featuring ads on D.C. Metro cars encourag...

On this episode we're joined by Joe Coughlin . Joe is the co-founder and editor-in-chief of The Record - North Shore , a non-profit newsroom serving Chicago's North Shore suburbs. Joe has 20 years in the journalism industry to draw upon. The Record and The Journalism Salute started at around the same time. In fact, Joe reached out to me not long after he started to tell me what he was doin...

On this episode we're joined by Nicole Lewis . Nicole is the engagement editor for The Marshall Project , leading the organization’s strategic efforts to deepen reporting that reaches communities most affected by the criminal legal system. She also leads certain investigative reporting projects. The Marshall Project is a non-profit nonpartisan newsroom covering America's criminal justice s...

On this episode we're joined by Ishan Thakore . Ishan is a climate and environmental reporter for Colorado Public Radio . He previously worked as a researcher, fact checker and field associate producer for Full Frontal with Samantha Bee , a show that ran on TBS that used comedy to tell and analyze news stories. We talked to Ishan about both jobs. He discussed his responsibilities on Full Front...

On The Journalism Salute we talk to journalists about who they are and what they do, with the intent of showing that journalists are not the enemy of the people. On this episode, we're joined by Rick Goldsmith . Rick is a 2-time Academy Award nominated documentary filmmaker. His most recent film, Stripped For Parts, American Journalism On The Brink is streaming on PBS.com through the end of 20...

On this episode we're joined by Gregorio Olivares Gutierrez . He is a political science and philosophy student at the University of Texas at Dallas. He's the editor-in-chief of The Retrograde , a student newspaper that operates independent of school administration. He previously was editor-in-chief of The Mercury, which was the campus newspaper that received funding from the school, until...

Hi everyone - Wanted to alert you to another journalism podcast that you might enjoy listening to. This is a recent episode of Small Press, Big Ideas hosted by Paul Gewuerz , who owns and runs a company that produces podcasts for news organizations. It's a podcast about the business of local news and community journalism. Today Paul sits down with Matthew Watkins, Editor-in-Chief of The Texas...

On this episode, we're joined by Laura Kebede-Twumasi . Laura is a journalist and public historian based in Virginia. She has formerly been a staff writer at the Richmond Times-Dispatch and an education reporter at Chalkbeat. From 2022 to 2025 she was a journalist in residence (and professor) at the University of Memphis, where she got her masters, and the Institute for Public Service Reportin...

On this episode we're joined by Ana Valdez . Ana is a multimedia journalist for KWCH-12 TV in Wichita, Kansas. Ana, a native of Bolivia, describes herself as dedicated to sharing bilingual stories, believing that journalism should create impact and that language should be a bridge, not a barrier. Ana shared her career path and gave examples of her work ranging from covering immigration and oth...

On this special edition of The Journalism Salute, we talk to Anita Pinto, a speech therapist for Urban Assembly Gateway School for Technology , a high school in Manhattan in which she started a journalism club last year. Anita is going to check in with us once a month to let us know how her club is doing, the challenges the students face, and the things they learn. We thank the non-profit Press Pa...

On this episode we're joined by Cara Kuhlman . Cara is the director of digital strategy and products for KNKX Public Radio in Seattle. She is also the founder of Future Tides , which provides news for people who work, play, and live on the Pacific Northwest's waterways. I'm interested in that in particular because Cara is doing some clever things to engage with her readership, includin...

On this episode we're joined by Elisha Brown . Elisha is the Reproductive Rights Today Newsletter for the non-profit States Newsroom . She's based in Durham, North Carolina and is a 2017 graduate of American University in Washington D.C. She worked for some prominent newsrooms prior to her current job, including The New York Times , The Atlantic, and The Daily Beast . Elisha talked about t...

On this episode we're joined by a great longform feature writer, John Glionna . John is a longtime journalist – older than most of our guests (he's in his 60s). He spent 35 years in newspapers including 26 at the Los Angeles Times . He's been based in different places around the world, including Seoul, South Korea and Las Vegas. This interview is intended to pick John's brain on wh...

On this episode we're joined by Laura Robertson . Laura just completed a stint as a writer for The Nome Nugget – that's Nome as in Nome, Alaska – and the Nugget is an award-winning weekly that serves a population of 3,700 in western Alaska. It is Alaska's oldest newspaper. She is a graduate of Princeton University. As she prepares to start a new job she talked about her experience both...

On this episode, we're joined by Logan Jaffe . Logan is based in Chicago and is a reporter for ProPublica focusing on newsletters. She's been there for 8 years and her work often centers on using historical research to tell stories about the present. She is a 2011 grad of the University of Florida and is pursuing a masters in public/applied history from Loyola, Chicago. Logan recently wrot...

On this episode, we're joined by Bryan Vance . Bryan is the founder of Stumptown Savings , a newsletter and website that helps the people of Portland Oregon shop for food smarter. This is a chance for us to talk about creator-model journalism and service journalism. Bryan talked about the motivation for starting Stumptown Savings (a combination of a Nieman Lab article and getting laid off), wh...