Get to Know Your Reporter: Alina Tugend, The New York Times
“Get to Know Your Reporter” is a series of interviews we’re having with journalists covering topics that are both timely and relevant to our audiences. Our aim is to advocate for and highlight the issues & policies that affect the children and families we serve, and one way is by providing information directly from experts in the field.
This month, we had the privilege of meeting with Alina Tugend, a freelance journalist from The New York Times.
Hello Alina – thank you for making time to meet and share with us. Can you please start of by taking time to meet with us. Let’s start off by getting to know you a little better.
I’m a life-long journalist, reporting on a variety of topics – from the environment to education and reporting over the years from California, Rhode Island, Washington DC, New York and the United Kingdom. For the past 24 years, I’ve been a freelance journalist for numerous national publications, including The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Chronicle of Higher Education and Kiplinger Retirement Report.  I have also written several explainers for the Education Writers Association and currently much of my work is focused on education, both K-12 and higher education.
From 2005-2015 I wrote the biweekly, “Shortcuts,” column for The New York Times business section. I’m also the author of the book “Better by Mistake: The Unexpected Benefits of Being Wrong,” and one of 25 women featured in the book “Mistakes I made at Work: 25 Influential Women Reflect on What They Got Out of Getting it Wrong.”
What motivates you as a journalist?
I love both reporting and writing. Journalism allows me to talk to a wide variety of people about so many different topics – even ones that sound dull usually end up being interesting in some way. And it’s often a challenge to fit that information together in a relatively small space in a way that is (hopefully) understandable, interesting and makes people consider an idea or concept in a way they haven’t before. I believe journalism, done thoughtfully and rigorously, is incredibly important in creating an engaged and educated citizenry – which, of course, is essential to a democracy.
It took me a long time to find a place to publish, report and write. I learned a lot while in the process, including how to better write on complicated and delicate issues that involve race and class, as education so often does. As an editor on a project once told me, it’s important not to try to smooth over contradictions, but write into the complexity. That means giving readers a real understanding of the possible ambiguity of an issue without simply falling into “on the one hand, on the other hand.”
What story/project are you the proudest of working on and why?
I would like to write some longer, in-depth stories, particularly on what good research has shown works successfully in helping students thrive in K-12 education.
See below for articles published by Alina:
Community Schools Become More Popular With Lessons Learned From the Pandemic
Art Can Fight Climate Change in More Ways Than One