About Us

Assistant Director

Yazmin Dominguez currently serves as the Assistant Director of the Local News Accelerator. Yazmin has been involved with supporting local news outlets in Chicago since 2019. She began her professional career at the Chicago Reader where she co-created the Chicago Independent Media Alliance alongside former Reader leadership. Since then, Yazmin has been involved as the Community Growth Assistant for Borderless Magazine where she supported the Development team with donor and audience recruitment strategies.

Contributing researcher, consultant and writer

Eric Rynston-Lobel contributes to the Local News Accelerator in a variety of roles, helping newsrooms conduct and analyze research and strategize how to expand their audiences. He’s also written numerous case studies, highlighting the work of news organizations in the LNA, and contributes to the LNI website. He received his BSJ from Medill in 2022 and previously worked as a reporter covering sports and politics for the Concord Monitor in New Hampshire.

Press Forward Chicago’s Peer Learning Community Program Coordinator

Audrey Azzo is the Program Coordinator for Press Forward Chicago’s Peer Learning Community, a cohort that sits within Medill’s Local News Accelerator and provides peer-to-peer learning opportunities to Press Forward Chicago grantees. An alumnus of the American University of Beirut and Medill, she pursues data driven approaches to support building a robust and inclusive local news ecosystem in Chicago.

Program Manager/Photographer

Hannah Carroll is a program manager and photographer for the Medill Local News Accelerator and a researcher and reporter for the Medill Local News Initiative. A graduate of Medill, Hannah previously interned for The Kitsap Sun in Bremerton, Washington, as well as the State of Local Journalism Task Force, where she researched journalism public policies and contributed to the Task Force’s final recommendation report. Hannah also works as a freelance photographer specializing in portraits, newborn and event photography, with previous clients including Cisco Systems and M. Harris & Co. for the Division Street: Revisited podcast.

Director – State of Local News Project

Metzger leads the State of Local News Project at Medill, overseeing the data collection, analysis and reporting on the landscape of local news. He previously researched local news at the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill, where he completed his PhD in 2024. Before joining the State of Local News Project, Metzger worked as a data analyst in the environmental industry.

Project Contributor

Brier Dudley is editor of The Seattle Times Save the Free Press public service initiative, which reports on the local journalism crisis and advocates for solutions. Dudley has been with the Times since 1998 and was a member of its editorial board for five years. He spent 14 years covering Microsoft and the technology industry, including nine years writing a tech column, and has won numerous regional and national journalism awards.

Research Associate

Bose is responsible for the data analysis and design portion of the State of Local News Report, coordinating the management, updating, and analysis of the newspaper, bright spots, and ethnic media databases. She is a Medill School of Journalism graduate with a degree in Media Innovation and Content Strategy. Before her current role, Bose worked as a mergers and acquisitions (M&A) lawyer in India, specializing in the Fin-Tech and Retail sectors.

Research Associate

Volk manages, updates and analyzes the Medill Local News Initiative’s database of news organizations. A two-time Northwestern graduate (MS and BS in journalism, double major in statistics), he has previously worked at the Star Tribune, the Local News Accelerator and Northwestern Athletics.

Director – Medill Midwest Solutions Journalism Hub, Medill faculty member

Deborah Douglas is Director of the Medill Midwest Solutions Journalism Hub, the award-winning journalist is a founding co-editor in chief of The Emancipator, a digital platform that reimagines abolitionist newspapers, and author of U.S. Civil Rights Trail: A Traveler’s Guide to the People, Places, and Events That Made the Movement.

Director – Medill Illinois News Bureau

Bob Rowley teaches the Journalism in Practice class on Israel as part of Medill’s undergraduate program. He is a contributing writer for the Washington Monthly and writes occasional op-eds for the Chicago Tribune. He was previously assistant vice president of media relations at Northwestern University. In addition, he teaches Content and Influencer Marketing in the MSC Program at the School of Communication. Rowley also lectures on education, public policy advocacy, communication and foreign reporting at Northwestern and other universities.

Director – Teach for Chicago Journalism Program

Michael Spikes credits himself as a practitioner-scholar who has spent more than 15 years in the fields of media literacy education (MLE), news media literacy (NML) and youth media. In practice, he most recently has been involved in implementation strategies for incorporating units of MLE into existing K-12 curricula for educators in Illinois in response to being the first state to implement a requirement of a unit of MLE for all high schools. In conjunction with this work, Spikes is the co-founder of the Illinois Media Literacy Coalition and the Illinois state chapter leader for Media Literacy Now.

Senior Program Coordinator, Teach for Chicago Journalism Program

Project Editor

Brewington is a contributing editor to the State of Local News report, overseeing Bright Spots. She was an editor at The Washington Post from 2001 to 2014 and from 2020 to 2024. She worked in The Post’s national and business news sections before joining the opinion department, where she was editor of the op-ed page from 2007 to 2014. She edited for The Wall Street Journal and the national security affairs website Lawfare before rejoining The Post in 2020. In addition to editing, Brewington launched and wrote The Post’s royal newsletter in 2022 and 2023. She was a spring 2024 media fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University.

Project Contributor

Liam Scott is a journalist who covers media and democracy. He is a contributing writer at the Columbia Journalism Review and a contributor at The Washington Post's Press Freedom Initiatives. Scott previously reported on press freedom at Voice of America, during which time he was named a Livingston Award finalist and won a National Press Club award.

Project Contributor

Farhi is the Washington Post's former media reporter. He left the paper at the end of 2023 after nearly 36 years as a staff writer, during which he also covered business, politics and general assignment features. He has also been a senior contributing editor to the American Journalism Review and now contributes to the Atlantic, the Athletic, the Daily Beast, and Columbia Journalism Review. He has been a frequent commentator on TV and radio about the media industry.

Project Contributor

Jackie Spinner is a professor of journalism at Columbia College Chicago, where she is faculty advisor to the Columbia Chronicle. She was a staff writer for The Washington Post for 14 years and covered the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. She is the editor of Gateway Journalism Review and the director and producer of two documentary films, Don't Forget Me and Morocco, Morocco. Morocco, Morocco aired on PBS in Chicago in 2022.

Professor and Associate Dean of Research

Edgerly specializes in audience insight, conducting research into how features of new media alter the way people consume news and how new media affects political engagement. She is a Faculty Associate at Northwestern’s Institute for Policy Research.

Associate Dean of Journalism, Assistant Professor

Bennett is an award-winning producer and reporter with more than 15 years of experience in broadcast television news and video production. Before joining Northwestern’s full-time faculty in 2006, Bennett was an on-air reporter for television stations in Chicago, Milwaukee, Green Bay, Wis., and Traverse City, Mich.

Research Assistant

Leah is a junior at Northwestern with experience in journalism and policy research. Before joining the State of Local News Project, she previously worked for the Institute for Policy Research and has written for The Daily Northwestern and several Chicago publications. With the State of Local News Project, she has been instrumental in tracking newspaper closures and transactions.

Research Assistant

Anavi is a sophomore at Northwestern studying journalism and social policy.  Along with the State of Local News Project, she conducts education research for the Institute for Youth in Policy and is an editor at The Daily Northwestern. For the State of Local News Project, her work focuses on the newspaper and digital sites database.

Research Assistant

Diya is a sophomore at Northwestern University studying Journalism and Computer Science. Outside of the Medill Local News Initiative, she is also an assistant editor at The Daily Northwestern.

Research Assistant

Research Assistant

Mary is a junior journalism major that joined the State of Local News team following her work on a bipartisan Illinois local news task force. She brings strong writing skills, data analysis knowledge, and a collaborative mindset to the project. In the past year, she has led a survey of major news organizations to analyze their content.

Research Assistant

Mitra is in her junior year at Northwestern and is pursuing a double major in journalism and international studies, with a minor in data science. Mitra’s skills in data analysis and technical knowledge of research methods have been invaluable to the team, and she has been integrally involved in a content analysis survey as well as our updates of digital news sites. Mitra has also been extensively involved with nonprofit fundraising work.

Research Assistant

Chloe is a sophomore journalism student at Medill. She brings extensive research experience and a strong passion for local news to the team, and has worked diligently on a content analysis survey, digital sites analysis, and news deserts due diligence. Outside of her work at the State of Local News Project, Chloe has taken on several leadership roles across campus, and is deeply involved in campus life and student affairs.

Executive Director, Medill Spiegel Research Center

DeGaris works with Ed Malthouse and Spiegel's team of post-docs and affiliated faculty to run the Medill Subscriber Engagement Index and other local news related research projects. With a background in market research and brand partnerships, he helps local news organizations use research to make decisions about revenue models, business portfolios, audience development, and products and processes.

Research Director

Malthouse is the Erastus Otis Haven Professor of Integrated Marketing Communications at Medill. He also has an appointment in the McCormick School of Engineering and Applied Sciences' Department of Industrial Engineering and Management Sciences. Malthouse is an expert in applied statistics, market research and media marketing.

Professor, Knight Chair in Digital Media Strategy

Gilbert oversees the Knight Lab and focuses on experimental technologies/strategies for media companies, including AI for media. He founded the Data-Driven Reporting Project and the NextGenNews project. Previously, he was The Washington Post’s Director of Strategic Initiatives and National Geographic’s Deputy Editor, Digital.

Chief Nerd

Germuska runs Knight Lab’s technology, professional staff and extracurricular activity. Immediately before joining the lab, he was a founding member of the Chicago Tribune’s News Apps team. He is the founder and project lead of the Census Reporter project, a website designed to make Census data easy for journalists. He also serves on the board of City Bureau, a Chicago-based civic journalism lab. His technology background is balanced by his BA in African History and MS in Product Design and Development Management, both earned from Northwestern.

Adviser

Penelope Muse Abernathy, a visiting professor at Northwestern University, is a former senior executive at The New York Times and Wall Street Journal, who specializes in researching local journalism. She is the author of two books and five reports, including The State of Local News (Northwestern University: 2022).