New StoryReach Cohort Will Tell the Stories That Matter Most in Midwest Communities

We are pleased to announce the launch of the 2025 StoryReach Midwest Fellowship, a talented cohort of seven journalists paired with local newsrooms who will dedicate the next year to telling urgent, deeply reported stories impacting communities in the U.S. Midwest. While the alarming decline in local news has created news deserts across the U.S. and as communities prepare to process the impacts of recent public media funding cuts, StoryReach aims to increase access to vital information that helps people make informed decisions about local issues.

This year’s Fellows include:

• Max Blaisdell (Invisible Institute), an award-winning Chicago investigative reporter who focuses on government accountability and data journalism;
• Ben Felder (Investigate Midwest), editor-in-chief leading national investigations into corporate agriculture and food systems;
• Kelly Garcia (Injustice Watch), a rising voice covering youth, prisons, and courts with a focus on Chicago’s southwest side;
• Michael Hawthorne (Chicago Tribune), a Pulitzer Prize finalist whose reporting has exposed environmental and public health threats across the Midwest;
• Jeff Oloizia (Madison Magazine), an award-winning features writer exploring education, culture, and human resilience;
• Andy Steiner (MinnPost), a seasoned writer chronicling mental health and addiction;  
• Isabelle Tavares (Planet Detroit), a multimedia journalist who covers environmental and public health impacts in Detroit’s Latino communities.

Together, they represent the power of investigative and narrative journalism to reveal truths, amplify voices, and spark change across the Midwest (and beyond).

This year's Fellows will build on the insights gained from our first cohort. Our 2024 cohort's projects engaged innovative storytelling and outreach to spark legislative reviews, policy reforms, and stronger oversight, earning national recognition in public service journalism. They tackled issues such as environmental health, reproductive rights, child welfare, tribal equity, climate impacts on fisheries, and election integrity.

StoryReach Fellows differentiate themselves by prioritizing engagement strategies from the outset of the program, ensuring vital information reaches those who will benefit most from the reporting. We’re sharing the 2024 Fellows’ audience engagement reflections to inspire other local journalists.

The Fellows and their newsrooms will benefit from the Pulitzer Center’s Data and Research team via online training, plus tailored guidance and project support from the Center’s grantees and staff. This year, we are thrilled to partner with MediaStorm Workshops to enhance the multimedia storytelling capabilities of our Fellows and news partners.  

We look forward to sharing insights and lessons learned from this cohort throughout the next 12 months. Stay tuned!

Best,

Impact

Grantee Alexa York was named Outstanding Young Journalist in the 19th annual Barlett and Steele Awards for her Pulitzer Center-supported project, The Legacy of Luckey. The awards honor investigative business journalism that exposes corporate abuses and their impact on public health, livelihoods, and communities.

Reporting for The Blade, York’s investigation into a Cold War weapons site in Ohio uncovered decades of government and contractor deception, revealing how officials ignored health risks, violated safety standards, and concealed radioactive contamination at the expense of workers, residents, and the environment.

Judges praised York's project, writing, “On her first story, York has offered a vibrant demonstration in the power of local newspaper journalism. Using investigative methods, she told a story across two print editions with multimedia elements that delivered news of importance to her community.”

Read the full project here. 

Photo of the Week

This message first appeared in the October 3, 2025, edition of the Pulitzer Center's weekly newsletter. Subscribe today.

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Caption for homepage photo: Willis Tower in Chicago, as seen on July 4, 2024. Image by Ritu Manoj Jethani/Shutterstock.