WBEZ Award Submissions

The relatively poor South American country has received four times more Venezuelans than the United States but offers a path to integration. We went to see it. Broadcast: June 16-18, 2024 Chip Mitchell, lead reporter Patrick Smith, audio editor Kate Grossman, lead editor

For-profit education programs in Illinois often leave students worse off than if they hadn’t gone to college at all by Lisa Kurian Philip, Esther Yoon-Ji Kang, Amy Qin, Alex Keefe and Steven Arroyo, edited by Natalie Moore Students at Illinois’ for-profits colleges often leave worse off than when they started Broadcast: 06/27/2024 For-profit cosmetology graduates rarely earn more than high school grads Broadcast: 06/28/2024

From the space race to a consent decree: the history of selective enrollment in Chicago schools Broadcast: 03/28/2024 Chicago’s most marginalized students have almost no shot of getting into CPS’ elite schools Broadcast: 07/09/2024

Chicago migrants are under pressure as the deadline to find permanent housing looms Broadcast: 02/06/2024 Migrants in Chicago file complaints about hostile treatment across city shelters Broadcast: 03/01/2024 Organizers try to calm chaos at a South Side Home Depot where migrants look for work Broadcast: 10/7/2024

Chicago is closing its biggest tent city but comes up short on promised apartments: The people left out include Porfirio and Melissa, a homeless couple recovering from addiction. To survive winter, they’re relying on each other. Broadcast 12/4/24 Chip Mitchell, reporter Patrick Smith, audio editor

"How I Support Democracy" audio series Mariah Woelfel WBEZ Chicago

Chicago's Migrant Crisis - New America Award Submission by WBEZ Award Submissions

Chicago's Migrant Crisis - PMJA Submission by WBEZ Award Submissions

Prisoncast! employs innovative, collaborative engaged journalism tactics to reach and serve a vulnerable, oft-forgotten audience with super creative, highly-produced audio journalism. This audio has been edited from its original broadcast length.

Prisoncast! employs innovative, collaborative engaged journalism tactics to reach and serve a vulnerable, oft-forgotten audience with super creative, highly produced audio journalism. This audio has been edited from it's original broadcast length.

This thoughtful conversation between a mother and her formerly incarcerated son offers both instructive advice for families in similar situations, and emotional reflections on parenting a child who is locked up.

These stories explore some of the most vulnerable yet political topics of the past year: abortion and mental health care. I tell one story through the eyes of a woman with a high-risk pregnancy who must travel across state lines for an abortion after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v Wade. In another story, I explore the trauma many migrants carry with them through a man who left his family behind in Colombia, and the helpers who are filling in the gaps of a frayed mental health system.

We investigated whether city of Chicago officials kept promises made after closing 50 schools in 2013. We found that the city failed to live up to its word in profound ways that continue to shape, and harm Chicago, its neighborhoods and remaining schools. We investigated three promises: Students would be better off in new schools; their former school buildings would be reborn as community assets; their new schools would be transformed. Our investigation showed how the city repeatedly fell short.

Since August of 2022, tens of thousands of migrants have been bused to Chicago, most arriving with little to nothing. The city of Chicago for the past year has struggled to serve this influx of migrants and asylum seekers. WBEZ brings you the stories of this migrant crisis, the personal experiences of those seeking refuge and the people of Chicago trying to help.

A months-long investigation finds serious misconduct accusations – including many complaints of racist policing – against Chicago and Illinois cops with ties to extremist and hate groups and exposes local law enforcement’s tolerance for those officers, who remain in the ranks of many agencies across the state.

Chicago Public Schools Tasting Test July 21, 2022 WBEZ Chicago 91.5FM Spot News

Motive Season 4, Episode 2 - Us and Them* Damaria Bates and Jimia Stokes started their jobs as therapists full of hope. But soon, they saw signs of abuse. When they reported the problems, fellow staff retaliated. We go behind the walls as they try to make changes from the inside out. Motive Season 4, Episode 4 - No Justice In Politics* Anthony Gay was sentenced to seven years of prison, but ended up with 97 years added to his sentence. Gay lived with mental illness and after time in solitary, he began to act out. He was repeatedly charged with battery — often for throwing liquids, like urine, at staff. Gay says the prison put him in traumatizing circumstances that made his mental illness worse, then punished him for the way he acted. Gay appealed to the local state’s attorney. This episode explores how his case shaped both the prison and the town around it. Originally Aired March 28 - December 14, 2022 WBEZ Chicago

Motive Season 4, Episode 1 The Motive Season 4 podcast tells interlocking stories of prisons and the small towns where they are located, revealing abuses that otherwise would have remained hidden behind the prison walls. The podcast uses investigative reporting, history, and first-person stories from prison towns and people working and incarcerated inside the Illinois Department of Corrections. March 28, 2022 WBEZ Chicago

Prisoncast! was a statewide engagement journalism collaboration & two-hour radio special for people inside Illinois prisons & their loved ones outside. The sound-rich program combined music, journalism, sound design & interviews to serve them with actionable utility & a forum for connection. IPR stations banded together so the special broadcast could reach every prison in the state. It super-served an oft-forgotten group – Illinois’ (disproportionately Black, low-income) prison population. August 28, 2022 WBEZ Chicago

Prisoncast! was an engagement journalism project and two-hour radio special for people in Illinois prisons and their loved ones on the outside. The sound-rich program combined music, journalism, sound design and interviews to serve this community with actionable utility and a forum for connection. WBEZ Chicago Original Broadcast Aug. 28, 2022