I’m a budding journalist in New York City eager to break into the industry. Before graduating from Eugene Lang College of Liberal Arts at The New School with a BA in Journalism & Design in May 2024, I worked as a Staff News and Features Reporter for the New School Free Press, our student-run publication, for about a year and a half. I was honored to have been recruited as a Research Fellow by renowned Author and Investigative Journalist Andrew Meier during my senior year.
Since graduating, I’ve been published as a Freelance Sports Reporter for Complex NTWRK, and have been working as a Private Researcher for Steve Procko Productions, gathering information and fact-checking an extensive project he is piecing together. I’ve gotten a few ghostwriting gigs on the side, which led to the two biographies I am currently writing! While I love this work, I miss writing articles and reporting from the frontlines— the thrill of a tight deadline and the generative energy only found in a bustling newsroom…
Though I love long-form investigative journalism and features, I’m experienced with breaking news & quick turnarounds— if the breaking piece leads to a follow-up or better yet, a tip for a new story, I am overjoyed.
Out of respect for the art form, I would never call myself a photographer, but I always have my camera on hand. I have some experience with audio and video editing, and as a consumer, I always appreciate a journalist who takes a multi-media approach to a story.
Now more than ever, with a news stream saturated with fearmongering, burnout, and overall news avoidance, it’s crucial that we as journalists get creative and deliver news in ways that break the boundaries of traditional reporting.
Kelsey Plum’s Confidence Shines on the Court and in the Tunnel as Aces Chase Three-Peat
Complex NTWRK
September 2024
Features
New School Free Press
March 2023
New School Free Press
April 2023
This was my first assignment at Complex, and I was honored to have been entrusted with a feature piece with a renowned athlete. Needless to say, every stage of this assignment was terrifying, but I’ve found the most nerve-wracking experiences to be the most formative, and it didn’t hurt that the piece was met with praise from all parties post-publishing.
What was intended to be a 15-minute interview soon ticked into 30 as the conversation had become so natural and fun that we had so much to talk about after I had exhausted my pre-rehearsed questions. Most of the quotes I ended up pulling for the piece actually came from the natural conversation rather than the hyper-researched list of questions, which allowed me to weave them seamlessly into the narrative and capture the true essence of her voice, sportsmanship, and all-around coolness.
I woke up to a call from my editor in the middle of the night. Fifteen minutes later, I found myself on the curb of 301 Residence Hall, pajamas and all.
As I was stepping out of a cab, I saw one of my primary sources standing in the lobby. She snuck me into a Resident Assistants meeting and gave me exclusive access to information and contacts.
I attached a mini-podcast segment that I made and edited for a Radio Documentary class. Please bare with me as it was my first time experimenting with audio...
New School Free Press
October 2023
New School Free Press
March 2024
This was the most intimidating piece to publish, both in terms of the fear of retaliation from the university, and the potential danger my sources could face. That said, the fear was far outweighed by the immense responsibility I felt to represent the situation accurately.
This was my first time getting the green light to work with anonymous sources— many of whom were reluctant to speak at all for fear of their safety. It took time (and numerous off-the-record coffee chats) to earn their trust. This in turn sparked a whole new fear— that my sources would feel misrepresented and/or exploited for content.
I was met with a huge wave of gratitude post publishing which was not only a relief, but such an honor, especially since my sources had put their jobs in jeopardy and potentially their safety. I was determined to make their sacrifices worthwhile. I am so proud of them, and I am truly proud of this piece.
It was it was an honor to tell this story.
Blake Eskin, a former professor of mine, came up to me and said “The piece made me outraged. It didn’t tell me to be outraged, but that was the feeling it evoked.” which, as a journalist, may be one of the most meaningful compliments Ive ever received.
This was the first piece I worked on for the Free Press, and I am still quite proud of it. I spoke to as many students as possible, gathered sources through word of mouth and social media, marched over to the local Fire Department to get the scoop, and worked with the university building manager to set the story straight.
The story originated from a plethora of pretty convincing rumors online that I extensively researched and eventually ended up dispelling. I am proud of the style that I used, inspired by a David Remnick article that I had read at the time, I separated the story into “acts”, and to my surprise, my editor didn’t cut them. I felt that it made such a long piece (actually one of the longest pieces the Free Press had published at the time) accessible and interesting to students. I was able to write in my preferred narrative style and turned what would have been a 300-word breaking piece into a long-form feature article.
New School Free Press
May 2024
I wrote this piece with my dear friend and colleague Olivia Young after obtaining exclusive information on students arrested at The New School’s Gaza solidarity encampment by relentlessly pestering the DCPI for information, both in person and over the phone. The New York Times hyperlinked our piece in their coverage which was pretty spectacular.
Covering the student protests while working on my senior thesis project was certainly a challenge, but I was ready at a moment’s notice to grab my camera and run down to wherever it was that the action was taking place that day. On one particular occasion, I found myself standing atop a barricade at 1 Police Plaza watching as the student protesters, who had been arrested and detained, walked out to an eruption of cheers from the mob of students who had come down in support. My fellow reporters and editors were stationed around the corner, sitting on the pavement in the scorching heat, laptops out, hotspots maxed, reporting live as we relayed information from the frontlines.
While USC may be known for its admissions scandals, and Harvard for its business program, The New School has garnered quite a portfolio of strikes over the past few years. I’ve been freelancing this semester, so I had the freedom to write a story that was less about the strike itself, but the reaction from those paying the tuition— whose opinions turned out to be a bit controversial to say the least.
Due to the online backlash the sources received for their strong-worded opinions, I was expecting at least one or two parents to berate me for the piece. I was surprised when my Facebook messages were filled with gratitude for giving the parents a voice and sharing their unfiltered opinions.
This article was a huge lesson on working with quote-heavy, opinion-based content, and turning it into something that still classifies as news. I had to weave together these polarizing statements without making it seem as though either side was favored. With a piece like this one, the structure itself can present as biased which was a tricky thing to navigate, especially when trying to maintain a cohesive narrative throughout the article.
Breaking News
Complex NTWRK
September 2024
New School Free Press
April 2023
I contributed six blurbs to this article, and seeing as I don’t follow sports as much as someone hired to be a sports reporter should, I treated each four-sentence segment as a full-blown investigation, tracking down each player’s history both on and off-court, their style evolution, and interview possible— luckily most of them have a pretty rich digital footprint— to capture their “vibe” well enough to write as though I’d been following each of them for years.
New School Free Press
September 2023
New School Free Press
April 2024
I was sitting in the cafeteria of the University Center when the fire alarms started ringing through the halls. Coincidentally, I was working on a story about a fire at a Residence Hall, which was notorious for regular false fire alarms. I followed the crowd of students as we evacuated the building, snapped a few photos, and gathered a few student quotes before marching straight to the local fire station— this was a frequent occurrence at this point in time— to try and get the scoop straight from the mothership.
The piece was edited and published an hour and a half after the incident occurred.
This was a double byline, my friend and colleague Isabella Gallo was sitting with me at the cafeteria at the time, and she helped to gather more student quotes after the fact and stuck around the University to see if she could speak to the responding officers.
I got a call from my editor, at around 9 pm— a pretty regular occurrence— about a petition milestone. Upon first glance, I learned that it was regarding the NewSWU (New School Student Workers Union), so I called up Isabella Gallo, who was the leading reporter turned expert on all union activity, to make sure that the piece represented the situation accurately.
In an attempt to maintain the accuracy of our original headline, “… reaches 100 signatures”, the story was written and edited within the hour. (“…petition reaches 113 signatures” isn’t as catchy as an even “100” right?). Of course, moments before hitting publish, we refreshed the petition to see a new signature, so we had to find a loophole— hence the “over 100 signatures”.
I have a great contact who is the Vice President of Building Management & Operations at The New School. He’s always been one of my most prolific sources and gave me a ton of intel, I was the first to break the news so that was awesome.
I am working on a follow-up that will include student opinions from current residents, past residents, and alumni, as well as staff and hopefully some anonymous RA’s.
For the past six months, I’ve been working on an article addressing and investigating the new policies that I mentioned throughout the piece, but we wanted to dispel some of the rumors that have been going around in a timely manner.