Children & Education Reporter

The Clarion-Ledger / clarionledger.com , part of the USA TODAY NETWORK is looking for a Children and education reporter to cover the unprecedented challenges facing K-12 education in Mississippi. This reporter should explore inequities through both short-term and longer-term reporting, and through explanatory, watchdog and storytelling pieces. This beat begins with K-12 education, but it should be considered much, much broader and thought of in a fundamentally different way. It includes topics ranging from young families, the socio-economic well-being of kids, access to health care, access to internships and jobs, drug abuse, obesity, food deserts, high-achieving students, third-grade reading achievement, dropout and graduation rates, rural issues, access to arts education, internet access, teacher development and quality, safety – anything and everything that impacts the well-being of Mississippi’s children and their futures. It should move away from day-to-day coverage of the school board, superintendent and district employees. Those topics remain an important component but should not dominate daily coverage decisions unless warranted. Think more in terms of shorter enterprise with mobile-first focus, including spotlighting trends and providing accountability. Video must be top of mind and filed with virtually every story. This digital journalist should be regularly filing weekend enterprise as well, including about one in-depth project a quarter. In addition to serving his/her local market, this journalist will occasionally work across the south region with other Children and Education reporters to brainstorm and potentially collaborate on broader region-wide topics. The ideal candidate has the proven ability to tailor storytelling to social, video and digital platforms. Candidates should have a track record of covering these issues on a regular basis and a portfolio that reflects deep reporting and examples of strong storytelling.