The past couple weeks contained a lot of bad news, but have been kind to me and my teammates at EdSource (where I used to work and still freelance) in one way: work we did in 2021 on the Following Covid Money in Education investigative report has gotten some accolades.

The overall package won first place from the California News Publisher’s Association (CNPA) for Investigative Reporting. Credit here goes to veteran reporter Thomas Peele’s footwork digging into the numbers and explaining the issues, and other reporters as they followed up.

In the Informational Graphic category I was awarded first place, along with my frequent collaborator data journalist Daniel J. Willis, for our work on the visual breakdown of the $69 billion in federal Covid relief to colleges nationwide, which also included some explanatory data journalism.

This follows on the announcement last week that we (Danny Willis and myself) are finalists for 2021 Visual Storytelling awards from the Education Writers Association (EWA) — also for work on Following Covid Money in Education.

Yuxuan Xie, along with Willis, is also recognized by EWA for work on Tracking learning modes of California students making public health data on changes in student learning following the Covid pandemic visible and accessible.