Reintroducing: The Investigative Reporting Workshop

A nonprofit that produces in-depth journalism by partnering aspiring journalists with professional newsrooms

Wesley Lowery here. As many of you know, but some of you don't, in July, I was named executive editor of the Investigative Reporting Workshop, a non-profit newsroom based at American University in Washington, D.C. 

The IRW is, in essence, a journalism clinic. I like to think of it as a training hospital. We take aspiring journalists and teach them to do complicated, high-level journalism by partnering them with leading professionals. At the core of our work are the beliefs that democracy needs rigorous journalism and that the best way to train aspiring journalists is by having them do that kind of work.

Each semester (and during the summer), the clinic has about 12 graduate and undergraduate student journalists from both American and other universities. The goal is for each to work on enterprise reporting targets that they pitch, participate in group data projects, and contribute to ambitious investigative projects being pursued by our professional media partners — such as our ongoing practicum that places six students on the Washington Post’s investigative team. 

Perhaps the best way to explain IRW's work is to highlight a few examples of what we've been up to since I arrived in July.

Broken promises: Each year, tens of thousands of people apply for the U.S. Diversity Visa program -- known as the "green card lottery." But this year's process was marred in chaos. Thousands who had made it to the final stage were abruptly told their interviews were cancelled. In some cases, people who'd been told they were accepted were later informed they would not in fact be given a green card. IRW student journalist Daniella Jimenez tracked down more than a dozen people who were promised a green card only to then be told they would not be admitted to the country. Her piece, published in partnership with Mother Jones and the Center for Public Integrity, was the only journalism that I've seen tell the powerful stories of these would-be immigrants whose lives were upended. "You wouldn’t imagine that it would become like this," explained Osama Mohamed, a Sudanese man who was told by U.S. officials that he'd been given a green card, only to then learn that in fact he had not. "You wouldn’t imagine that you would be an outsider floundering in these statistics." 

From the Data Lab: Aarushi Sahejpal, a rising star in data journalism, helps spearhead our data reporting efforts. One of his most recent collaborations was with the talented folks over at WAMU/DCist, looking at the stunning amount of overtime pay being received by some police officers in Washington, D.C. One officer is on pace to earn more in total compensation this year than the police chief and the mayor. This investigation required complicated public records and data work (and benefited from some great graphics work by IRW student Cleo Saliano Pool).

A Slow Killer: IRW student Hannah Levitan dispatched to East Texas as part of an investigation, reported in partnership with Public Health Watch and published in the Texas Tribune, into disproportionately high rates of diabetes in Texas, and how the state’s refusal to expand access to health insurance could be making matters worse.

From the Practicum: IRW’s Senior Editor John Sullivan oversees a practicum of six students who are embedded at the Washington Post, helping the paper execute some of its most labor-intensive and complicated work. In recent months, the Post has published a number of investigations that were powered by IRW students: a probe into the meteoric expansion of homeschooling in America since the pandemic; an investigation into doctors who risked their patients’ lives by spreading misinformation during the COVID pandemic and a deep dive into the unregulated midwife industry.

What comes next and how you can support:

2024 promises to be an exciting year at the IRW. We’ve already begun work looking at school gun violence, anti-trans legislation across the country, and the legacy of lead in major American cities — in addition to a number of other projects that we can’t talk about just yet.

One key way you can help is by chipping in to our year-end fundraising campaign. Like most non-profit news organizations, we finance our work through the support of foundations and individual donors. At the end of each year we take advantage of the Newsmatch program, which allows us to match any donation of up to $1,000 that comes in. And so, I hope you’ll consider a donation, no matter the size, to IRW, to help fund our journalism and help train the rising generation of journalists.

Thanks for reading, and for supporting the IRW.

—Wesley Lowery

Donations made to IRW before the end of the year will be matched—that means your support will have double the impact. Please invest in trusted journalism by supporting the Investigative Reporting Workshop.