Meet the 2019 Social Journalism Class at the Newmark School of Journalism at CUNY
A dynamic group of journalists who listen and engage with communities. They offer empathy. They question everything. They’re truth tellers.
By Ariam Alula, ‘19
Ariam Alula serves families of color navigating autism. During college, Ariam interned at amNewYork, NY1 News, and Inter Press Service and participated in a two-week fellowship with the New York Times Student Journalism Institute. She graduated from Stony Brook University with a Bachelor’s in journalism in 2013 and has since traveled the world. She has been to 15+ domestic and international cities and taught English in East Asia for 18 months. She details her everyday experiences in a frayed scrapbook and blogs about her identity as an Eritrean-American on her downtime.
Email: ariam.alula@journalism.cuny.edu
Twitter: @Ariam_Alula
Instagram: @ariaminaxxalula
Erica Anderson is an actor, filmmaker, freelance producer, and co-founder of Seed&Spark, an innovative crowdfunding and film streaming platform. Since 2012, the platform has helped over 1200 filmmakers build their audience and raise over $16 million. She also co-created the acclaimed adult sex ed series F*ck Yes and has worked with production companies in New York and Los Angeles, including IFC, The Food Network, BRAVO, NASDAQ, Target, and Microsoft. Erica is a graduate of Smith College. She will be working with families involved in transracial adoption.
Email: erica.anderson@journalism.cuny.edu
Twitter: @wingsofapig
Alexa Beyer has a passion for standing up for communities that are taken advantage of by big corporations and local governments. She is using her time in the social journalism program to specialize in covering residents of Long Island City, Queens and other communities impacted by gentrification. She graduated from Middlebury College in 2016 with a degree in geography and runs a blog called ‘Bad Democrat’ where she talks about what’s wrong with the Democratic status quo.
Email: alexa.beyer@journalism.cuny.edu
Lena Camilletti graduated from West Virginia University in 2017 with a degree in journalism. She previously worked at The Observer, a daily serving Jefferson County in the Eastern Panhandle, where she wrote business briefs and feature articles for the community. During college, she held editorial roles at The Daily Athenaeum and 100 Days in Appalachia, an independent news outlet incubated at the Media Innovation Center at WVU. She hopes to serve communities struggling with addiction across the nation and globally.
Email: lena.camilletti@journalism.cuny.edu
Twitter: @lena.camilletti
Lauren Costantino is using journalism to investigate inequities in public schools across America. A former high school English teacher, Lauren graduated from Florida State University with a degree in English education in 2014. That same year, she won Rookie Teacher of the Year, and in 2016, she won the My Teacher My Hero Award for Empathy for Students. While at The Craig Newmark Graduate School for Journalism, she hopes to merge her two passions of education and journalism to serve students who are receiving an alternative education in District 79.
Email: lauren.costantino@journalism.cuny.edu
Twitter: @misscostantino
Tori Hoffman is a first-generation Hispanic student from Denver, CO. She graduated from Seattle Pacific University with a BA in journalism and digital media in June 2018. During college, Hoffman served as the editor-in-chief of The Falcon, SPU’s independent student newspaper and served as the editorial assistant to the managing editor of Response Magazine, a community-based publication in SPU’s Office of University Communications. In 2017, she also participated in the Online News Association Student Newsroom and Innovation Lab at the 2017 conference Washington D.C. She is working with young men ages 12–16 to explore masculinity in America and how young men navigate it.
Email: tori.hoffman@journalism.cuny.edu
Twitter: @torihoffman15
Instagram: @tori.lh
Kerem Inal finished his undergraduate degree in anthropology at Yeditepe University in his native Turkey. He wrote his senior thesis on the “demoscene,” a computer art subculture. Before enrolling in the social journalism program, he worked at an ethnographic research company. Kerem currently works with the hacker community to uncover the positive impact they can have on society. He is also interested in all forms of technology and coding language cultures.
Email: kerem.inal@journalism.cuny.edu
Daniel Laplaza graduated with a degree in film and television communications from Boston University in 2015. He went on to work for an entertainment PR firm, publicizing independent films and feature documentaries, such as Do Not Resist and Zero Days. Daniel is currently working with people with disabilities to report on accessibility barriers in New York City.
Email: daniel.laplaza@journalism.cuny.edu
Twitter: @djlplaza
Instagram: @djlplaza
Beatrix Lockwood plans to serve communities in jails and prisons. She is a contributor at The Trace, where she worked previously as an engagement fellow. Before that, she was a content manager for ThoughtCo (formerly About.com education) and an intern at WYPR in Baltimore. She has a degree in history from Stanford. She will be interning at The Marshall Project this summer.
Email: beatrix.lockwood@journalism.cuny.edu
Twitter: @BeeLockwood
Isadora Varejao is a graduate of Pontifical Catholic University (PUC-Rio) in her native Brazil, with a degree in journalism. Before moving to New York City in 2015, she worked for the Mayor’s Office of Rio de Janeiro and freelanced for Bandnews and Radio Tupi as a radio reporter. She also worked as health and science writer for the Ministry of Health. She plans to serve Latina women navigating green card marriages.
Email: isadora.varejao@journalism.cuny.edu
Twitter: @brazooklyn
Mekdela Maskal has a B.S. in Media Communications and Culture from NYU, and has analyzed research data, designed technologies and implemented communications strategies for e-commerce brands since graduating in 2013. She was recently recognized as a rising star in photography by Adobe, honored for her writing and photography practice that subverts the western normative lens. Her family’s immigration from Ethiopia to the United States and their passion for health and science is core to her interest in sustainability and peace journalism.
Email: mekdela.maskal@journalism.cuny.edu
Twitter: @mekdeezy
Zanna K. McKay is a graduate of Mount Holyoke College. The Wyoming native has lived in and reported from Mali, Vietnam, Italy, and the United States with support from Round Earth Media. Her work, which often focuses on people striving toward solutions to pressing social and environmental issues, has been featured in USA Today, AJ+, and the BBC. She’s interested in reporting on and serving people in long-term recovery from substance use disorders while at the Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism.
Email: zanna.mckay@journalism.cuny.edu
Instagram: @bozannza
Tiziana Rinaldi is an award-winning journalist and television producer whose credits include working as a correspondent for Global Nation, the immigration desk of PRI.org and PRI The World, covering family topics for Courier Life Publications/News Corp., as well as staff positions at ABC News, Lightworks Producing Group, RAI-Radio Televisione Italiana and the U.S. Bureau of the national Italian newspaper Il Messaggero. She graduated from the University of Perugia in her native Italy with a Master of Business Administration. At Newmark, Tiziana is reporting on and serving immigrants in the U.S. who are malemployed: foreign-educated newcomers such as medical doctors, teachers, journalists or engineers who encounter socio-economic barriers to integration in the U.S. and end up in jobs that hardly require high school diplomas.
Email: tiziana.rinaldi@journalism.cuny.edu
Twitter: @TizianaSRinaldi
Lakshmi Sivadas is serving coastal communities and resiliency efforts in underrepresented areas of New York City. She is a graduate of the Asian College of Journalism and a native of India. In previous roles, she was a business reporter for NDTV and an assistant producer for CNBC-TV18, where she helped produce two prime-time, award-winning daily news shows. She is now focusing on engagement journalism and believes that embedded journalists and editorial decentralization are key to the future of journalism. She hopes to be part of those reimagining the business of journalism.
Email: lakshmi.sivadas@journalism.cuny.edu
Twitter: @Lsivadas
Instagram: @Lsivadas
Diara J. Townes loves science and wants to effectively communicate it to local communities impacted by climate change. Raised on Long Island, Diara plans to leverage her degree in marine and environmental science from Hampton University and years of informal science communication to advance the journalistic attention given to environmental policies in local communities.
Email: diara.townes@journalism.cuny.edu
Twitter: @CuriousScout
