Race and Equity

With a dramatic flourish, a longtime education activist recently unfurled a Confederate battle flag in front of Pinellas County School Board members, saying they had failed black students in five neighborhood schools in south St. Petersburg.

Social workers at Rhode Island’s Department of Children, Youth, and Families say they have too many cases to really make a difference in children’s lives. The agency is already facing criticism for other problems, including one of the nation’s highest percentages of foster children in group homes.

Black leaders in Florida's Pinellas County say the school district broke promises they made to settle a lawsuit accusing them of shortchanging black students. The criticism comes in the wake of the publication of "Failure Factories," a yearlong investigation by the Tampa Bay Times.

"As a journalist and as a person, there’s something therapeutic about being entrusted with someone’s personal rock bottom, and being a vessel for their story," writes journalist Jazelle Hunt. "There’s something therapeutic and powerful about standing with someone in his or her pain."

Michael LaForgia wrote this story for the Tampa Bay Times as part of a 2015 National Health Journalism Fellowship....

Children who experience abuse or neglect–or even the stress of poverty—can have serious health problems later in life. That’s one of many challenges for children in Rhode Island’s child welfare system.

When LA Times reporter Soumya Karlamangla started looking into health care policies affecting immigrants, she had no idea how fast the California policy landscape was about to change. Reflecting on her reporting journey over the past year, Karlamangla offers key tips for staying ahead of the story.

African American men in North Carolina suffer from some of the world’s highest rates of prostate cancer, but it's not exactly clear why. That tip was enough to launch News & Observer reporter Jay Price on a long reporting journey that would take him to churches, barber shops and community meetings.

Five of the worst schools in Florida are clustered in a 15-square-mile area in Pinellas County’s black neighborhoods. Behavior problems are rampant. Teacher turnover is constant. Michael LaForgia of the Tampa Bay Times investigates how and why these schools are failing kids.

For many contemporary Native American communities, accessing healthy food in any form is a challenge. While the federal government offers some assistance, it's often not enough. For my fellowship project, I'll investigate what resources tribes are using – or not – to address food insecurity.