A New Zealand-born Niuean educator says being recognised in the King’s Birthday honours list reflects the importance of connecting young tagata Niue in Aotearoa to their roots.

Mele Ikiua, who hails from the village of Hakupu Atua in Niue, has been named a member of the New Zealand Order of Merit for services to vagahau Niue language and education.

She told RNZ Pacific the most significant achievement in her career to date had been the promotion of vagahau Niue in the NCEA system.

• READ MORE: King’s Birthday Honours 2025 — the full list of recipients

The change in 2023 enabled vagahau Niue learners to earn literacy credits in the subject, and receive recognition beyond “achieved” in the NCEA system. That, Ikiua said, was about continuing to increase learning opportunities for young Niue people in Aotearoa.

“Because if you look at it, the work that we do — and I say ‘we’ because there’s a lot of people other than myself — we’re here to try and maintain, and try and hold onto, our language because they say our language is very, very endangered.

“The bigger picture for young Niue learners who haven’t connected, or haven’t been able to learn about their vagahau or where they come from [is that] it’s a safe place for them to come and learn . . . There’s no judgement, and they learn the basic foundations before they can delve deeper.”

Her work and advocacy for Niuean culture and vagahau Niue has also extended beyond the formal education system.

Niue stage at Polyfest
Since 2014, Ikiua had been the co-ordinator of the Niue stage at Polyfest, a role she took up after being involved in the festival as a tutor. She also established Three Star Nation, a network which provides leadership, educational and cultural programmes for young people.

Last year, Ikiua also set up the Tokiofa Arts Academy, the world’s first Niue Performing Arts Academy. And in February this year, Three Star Nation held Hologa Niue — the first ever Niuean arts and culture festival in Auckland.

She said being recognised in the King’s Birthday honours list was a shared achievement.

“This award is not only mine. It belongs to the family. It belongs to the village. And my colleagues have been amazing too. It’s for us all.”

She is one of several Pasifika honoured in this weekend’s list.

Others include long-serving Auckland councillor and former National MP Anae Arthur Anae; Air Rarotonga chief executive officer and owner Ewan Francis Smith; Okesene Galo; Ngatepaeru Marsters and Viliami Teumohenga.

Cook Islander, Berry Rangi has been awarded a King’s Service Medal for services to the community, particularly Pacific peoples.

Lifted breast screening rates
She has been instrumental in lifting the coverage rates of breast and cervical screening for Pacific women in Hawke’s Bay.

“When you grow up in the islands, you’re not for yourself – you’re for everybody,” she said.

“You’re for the village, for your island.”

She said when she moved to Napier there were very few Pasifika in the city — there were more in Hastings, the nearby city to the south.

“I did things because I knew there was a need for our people, and I’d just go out and do it without having to be asked.”

Berry Rangi also co-founded Tiare Ahuriri, the Napier branch of the national Pacific women’s organisation, PACIFICA.

She has been a Meals on Wheels volunteer with the Red Cross in Napier since 1990 and has been recognised for her 34 years of service in this role.

Maintaining a heritage craft
She also contributes to maintaining the heritage craft of tivaevae (quilting) by delivering workshops to people of all ages and communities across Hawke’s Bay.

Another honours recipient is Uili Galo, who has been made a Member of the New Zealand Order of Merit for services to the Tokelau community.

Galo, of the Tokelau Aotearoa Leaders Council, said it is very gratifying to see his community’s efforts acknolwedged at the highest level.

“I’ve got a lot of people behind me, my elders that I need to acknowledge and thank . . .  my kainga,” he said.

“While the award has been given against my name, it’s them that have been doing all the hard work.”

He said his community came to Aotearoa in the 1970s.

“Right through they’ve been trying to capture their culture and who they are as a people. But obviously as new generations are born here, they assimilate into the pa’alangi world, and somehow lose a sense of who they are.

“A lot of our youth are not quite sure who they are. They know obviously the pa’alangi world they live in, but the challenge of them is to know their identity, that’s really important.”

Pasifika sports duo say recognition is for everyone
Two sporting recipients named as Members of the New Zealand Order of Merit in the King’s Birthday Honours say the honour is for all those who have worked with them.

Pauline-Jean Henrietta Luyten, who is of Tongan heritage, has been involved with rugby at different levels over the years, and is currently a co-chair of New Zealand Rugby’s Pacific Advisory Group.

Annie Burma Teina Tangata Esita Scoon, of Cook Islands heritage, has been involved with softball since she played the sport in school years ago.

While they have been “committed” to their sports loves, their contribution to the different Pasifika communities they serve is being recognised.

Luyten told RNZ Pacific she was humbled and shocked that people took the time to actually put a nomination through.

“You know, all the work we do, it’s in service of all of our communities and our families, and you don’t really look for recognition,” she said.

“The family, the community, everyone who have worked with me and encouraged me they all deserve this recognition.”

Luyten, who has links in Ha’apai, Tonga, said she has loved being involved in rugby, starting off as a junior player and went through the school competition.

Community and provincial rugby
After moving down to Timaru, she was involved with community and provincial rugby, before she got pulled into New Zealand Rugby Pacific Advisory Group.

Luyten made New Zealand rugby history as the first woman of Pacific Island descent to be appointed to a provincial union board in 2019.

She was a board member of the South Canterbury Rugby Football Union and played fullback at Timaru Girls’ High School back in 1997, when rugby competition was first introduced .

Her mother Ailine was one of the first Tongan women to take up residence in Timaru. That was back in the early 1970s.

As well as a law degree at Otago University Luyten completed a Bachelor of Science in 2005 and then went on to complete post-graduate studies in sports medicine in 2009.

She is also a founding member of the Tongan Society South Canterbury which was established in 2016.

Opportunities for Pasifika families
On her rugby involvement, she said the game provides opportunities for Pasifika families and she is happy to be contributing as an administrator.

“Where I know I can contribute has been in that non-playing space and sort of understanding the rugby system, because it’s so big, so complex and kind of challenging.”

Fighting the stereotypes that “Pasifika can’t be directors” has been a major one.

“Some people think there’s not enough of us out there. But for me, I’m like, nah we’ve got people,” she stated.

“We’ve got heaps of people all over the show that can actually step into these roles.

“They may be experienced in different sectors, like the health sector, social sector, financial, but maybe haven’t quite crossed hard enough into the rugby space. So I feel it’s my duty to to do everything I can to create those spaces for our kids, for the future.”

Call for two rugby votes
Earlier this month the group registered the New Zealand Pasifika Rugby Council, which moved a motion, with the support of some local unions, that Pasifika be given two votes within New Zealand Rugby.

“So this was an opportunity too for us to actually be fully embedded into the New Zealand Rugby system.

“But unfortunately, the magic number was 61.3 [percent] and we literally got 61, so it was 0.3 percent less voting, and that was disappointing.”

Luyten said she and the Pacific advisory team will keep working and fighting to get what they have set their mind on.

For Scoon, the acknowledgement was recognition of everyone else who are behind the scenes, doing the work.

She said the award was for the Pasifika people in her community in the Palmerston North area.

Voice is for ‘them’
“To me what stands out is that our Pasifika people will be recognized that they’ve had a voice out there,” she said.

“So, it’s for them really; it’s not me, it’s them. They get the recognition that’s due to them. I love my Pacific people down here.”

Scoon is a name well known among the Palmerston North Pasifika and softball communities.

The 78-year-old has played, officiated, coached and now administers the game of softball.

She was born in the Cook Islands and moved with her family to New Zealand in 1948. Her first involvement with softball was in school, as a nine-year-old in Auckland.

Then she helped her children as a coach.

“And then that sort of lead on to learning how to score the game, then coaching the game, yes, and then to just being an administrator of the game,” she said.

Passion for the game
“I’ve gone through softball – I’ve been the chief scorer at national tournaments, I’ve selected at tournaments, and it’s been good because I’d like to think that what I taught my children is a passion for the game, because a lot of them are still involved.”

A car accident years ago has left her wheelchair-bound.

She has also competed as at the Paraplegic Games where she said she proved that “although disabled, there were things that we could do if you just manipulate your body a wee bit and try and think it may not pan out as much as possible, but it does work”.

“All you need to do is just try get out there, but also encourage other people to come out.”

She has kept passing on her softball knowledge to school children.

In her community work, Scoon said she just keeps encouraging people to keep working on what they want to achieve and not to shy away from speaking their mind.

Setting a goal
“I told everybody that they set a goal and work on achieving that goal,” she said.

“And also encouraged alot of them to not be shy and don’t back off if you want something.”

She said one of the challenging experiences, in working with the Pasifika community, is the belief by some that they may not be good enough.

Her advice to many is to learn what they can and try to improve, so that they can get better in life.

“I wasn’t born like this,” she said, referring to her disability.

“You pick out what suits you but because our island people — we’re very shy people and we’re proud. We’re very proud people. Rather than make a fuss, we’d rather step back.

“They shouldn’t and they need to stand up and they want to be recognised.”

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.

But even though Lively was awarded a $39,696 grant for the project through a U.S. Department of Agriculture program called the Rural Energy for America Program, or REAP, he’s not sure if he’ll be able to get the solar panels he wants. As one of thousands of grant awardees across the country, Lively was banking on that money to cover half the cost of the solar project.

Within President Donald Trump’s first few days in office, he issued a set of executive orders intended to crack down on government initiatives geared toward addressing climate change, improving environmental justice, and supporting diversity, equity, and inclusion. Amidst the now-familiar wave of fluctuations and uncertainty for farmers and business owners who had been counting on funding from various programs, Lively was told that the funding for REAP had been paused. 

Last week, Lively got a welcome update: The money was now unfrozen.

On March 25, the U.S. Department of Agriculture announced it will release grant money through REAP and two other clean energy programs partly supported by the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act. But there appeared to be some fine print.

In the announcement, the USDA also invited grant and loan recipients to voluntarily revise their proposals to align with Trump’s executive order by “eliminating Biden-era DEIA and climate mandates embedded in previous proposals.” 

In an email, a USDA spokesperson said that people who had already been awarded funding could voluntarily “review and revise” their plans within 30 days to more closely align with the Trump administration’s executive order. If recipients confirm in writing that they don’t want to change anything about their proposals, the USDA said “processing” for their projects would continue immediately. If recipients don’t communicate with the USDA, “disbursements and other actions will resume after the 30 days,” according to the statement. But many questions remain, and the agency did not address Grist’s requests for clarification.

For instance, the agency did not offer specifics about the timeline for already-approved projects to actually receive funds; whether or not the agency will open new application periods; whether the funding announcement and invitation to revise apply to REAP grants, loans, or both; and whether the announcement applies to future REAP applications. 

Perhaps most crucially, it is also not clear what the agency means by “processing”: Will those who choose not to change their applications still receive the money they’d been awarded or will their proposals be subjected to another review process? The phrase “other actions” has many observers worried. 

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Mike Lavender, the policy director at the National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition, doesn’t expect to see the request barring farmers and businesses from receiving the money they are due, but acknowledges that “anything is possible with this USDA.” 

“Our current understanding from the USDA is that REAP grantees will receive the reimbursements that they are owed under their signed grant agreements whether or not they choose to complete the voluntary REAP review form, including whether they submit the form stating they do not intend to make any modifications to their projects,” said Lavender. “It’s critical that USDA clearly and publicly affirms the voluntary nature of the REAP review to avoid sowing further confusion and uncertainty.” 

Rebecca Wolf, a senior food policy analyst with the nonprofit Food & Water Watch, isn’t as confident that the program will proceed seamlessly. She said the very act of issuing the invitation in conjunction with news about resuming funding is likely to prompt farmers and business owners to feel pressured to comply for fear of not getting their money. 

The ambiguity of it all is its own source of stress. 

“I know there are folks that were awarded solar grants, that are wondering, ‘Does this even fall in line anymore? Because we know that the administration is keen more on fossil fuels,’” Wolf said. “So there’s just a ton of that type of, ‘What does this actually mean?’” What’s more, Wolf fears that this may only be the start of such so-called “open requests” issued by the agency to those waiting on paused funds. 

The USDA’s efforts to comply with Trump’s executive orders are taking different shapes across the vast agency. A leaked internal memo circulated within the USDA’s Agricultural Research Service detailed instructions on reviewing “agreements” for a list of banned keywords, including “people of color,” “climate change,” and “clean energy,” as first reported by the nonprofit news organization More Perfect Union. And, last week, the USDA’s Rural Development agency scrubbed the application process for 14 programs — including REAP — of “scoring criteria” tied to equity and climate resilience goals established by the Biden administration. 

Representative Chellie Pingree, the Democrat who represents part of southern Maine and is a member of the House Agriculture Committee, said she considers the USDA’s request for revisions “just another example of the chaos and confusion that have become hallmarks of the Trump Administration.” She added that the move is “petty and cruel.”

Representative Jill Tokuda, the Democrat who represents Hawai‘i’s second congressional district and also sits on the Agriculture Committee, told Grist, “USDA’s job is to support our agricultural producers and rural communities. It’s impossible to do that when USDA is adding unnecessary bureaucratic restrictions and blocking federal resources that farmers and rural communities depend on just to appease President Trump’s extreme agenda. Our farmers don’t have time to be jumping through extra hoops to get support for critical conservation work they depend on for their livelihoods. They need and deserve better.”

Grist reached out to the Republican chair of the House Agriculture Committee and two other GOP members for comment, none of whom responded before publication. 

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Other critics say the USDA’s actions could result in a return to the discriminatory practices the agency conducted for decades, such as rejecting disproportionately more loans for Black farmers than for any other demographic group and excluding Indigenous farmers from agricultural programs. Activists and scientists have also argued that many of the solutions necessary to mitigate agriculture’s gargantuan carbon footprint have been developed by marginalized communities. In this way, Trump’s attacks on justice and climate-smart agriculture are linked. 

“From a climate-justice perspective, the implications of this decision, and the equally hostile policies we know are coming, are nothing short of devastating,” Pingree said.  

All told, the USDA has so far complied with Trump’s efforts to eliminate DEI initiatives and climate action mechanisms across every level of the federal government. The agency has halted education, research, and state funding. It has paused a slate of programs receiving IRA funds and gutted others. The public messaging behind these moves has remained consistent: the agency, working in lockstep with the initiative known as the Department of Government Efficiency, aims “to enhance the USDA workforce and eliminate wasteful spending.” 

According to Wolf, of Food & Water Watch, the USDA’s actions suggest the opposite. “We’ve seen a real gutting from Day 1, whether it’s jobs or funding,” she said. “And a very clear indication of how things are going to look moving forward.” 

For his part, Jim Lively has decided to wait out the 30-day period rather than change any language. “It’s just a solar equipment installation project. There was no DEIA anything in there. So I don’t really think I need to make any changes,” he said. “We may just take our chances, leave things as they are, and hopefully we get a funding award announcement at the end of the month.”

This story was originally published by Grist with the headline The USDA is unfreezing clean energy money — but ‘inviting’ grant recipients to remove DEI and climate language on Apr 4, 2025.

This content originally appeared on Grist and was authored by Ayurella Horn-Muller.

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President Donald Trump was asked at a press conference this month if there were any federal agencies or programs that Elon Musk’s newly formed Department of Government Efficiency wouldn’t be allowed to mess with.

“Social Security will not be touched,” Trump answered, echoing a promise he has been making for years. Despite his eagerness to explode treaties, shutter entire government agencies and abandon decades-old ways of doing things, the president understands that Social Security benefits for seniors are sacrosanct.

Still, the DOGE team landed at the Social Security Administration this week, with Musk drawing attention for his outlandish claims that large numbers of 150-year-old “vampires” are receiving Social Security payments. DOGE has begun installing its own operatives, including an engineer linked to tweets promoting eugenics and executives with a cut-first-fix-later philosophy, in multiple top positions at the Social Security Administration.

Their first wave of actions — initiating the elimination of 41 jobs and the closing of at least 10 local offices, so far — was largely lost in the rush of headlines. Those first steps might seem restrained compared with the mass firings that DOGE has pursued at other federal agencies. But Social Security recipients rely on in-person service in all 50 states, and the shuttering of offices, reported on DOGE’s website to include locations everywhere from rural West Virginia to Las Vegas, could be hugely consequential. The closures potentially reduce access to Social Security for some of the most vulnerable people in this country — including not just retirees but also individuals with severe physical and intellectual disabilities, as well as children whose parents have died and who’ve been left in poverty.

The Social Security Administration, headquartered just outside Baltimore, has more than 1,200 regional and field offices — nearly a fifth of all of the federal government’s offices nationwide. There are 119,000 visitors to these brick-and-mortar facilities every business day. Many of them do not have high levels of computer and internet literacy and need someone to help them through all the legalese of a nearly century-old social program with a wonky user interface. This is also where elderly people can apply for Medicare, which doesn’t have physical outposts of its own. And it’s where hearings are held — due process provided — for beneficiaries who believe that they have been unfairly kicked off of desperately needed assistance.

“It’s where people access government,” said Kathleen Romig, a longtime expert on the program at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities who recently served at the Social Security Administration in a temporary capacity.

In the event of more Social Security office closures like the ones that the Trump administration has begun pursuing — the president is broadly moving to close a range of offices and has even floated the idea of terminating every single federal lease — it is disproportionately poor people with lower levels of education who will become less likely to apply for and get help, research on past closures has found.

The White House press office did not respond to a request for comment. But in a recent Fox News interview, press secretary Karoline Leavitt criticized “fake news reporters” for “fear-mongering” about Social Security’s future under the Trump administration. She said that Musk is only going after fraud and waste in the program.

The roughly 15 million recipients of Supplemental Security Income and Social Security Disability Insurance benefits — many of whom are severely disabled and destitute, or are orphans — are among the least politically powerful people in the U.S. Many told ProPublica that the distance to their closest Social Security office is already long, and that wait times to get a representative on the phone or a claim or an appeal processed can range from hours to years. Even before Trump was inaugurated, the agency’s staffing levels were at a 50-year low due to a decade of budget caps and cuts authored by congressional Republicans.

Several SSI and SSDI beneficiaries in rural areas told ProPublica that they have been watching with anxiety as Trump and Musk slash through federal agencies, knowing that any further office or staffing cuts to the Social Security Administration could be catastrophic for them.

Bryan Dooley, a 34-year-old with cerebral palsy who lives outside of Winston Salem, North Carolina, uses a wheelchair and struggles with speaking (he communicated with me through a caretaker). He said that his Social Security benefits, which he receives directly because of his disability and because that disability entitles him to a portion of his late mother’s Social Security, were mistakenly cut off several months ago. As he fights to get the assistance turned back on, he has been depleting his savings account trying to pay his mortgage.

“I really want to stay in the house where I lived with my mother,” he said. “Otherwise it’s a 24-hour care facility for me.”

Dooley, who works part time for a nonprofit called Solutions for Independence that helps others with disabilities, said that “we’re all watching” the developments at the Social Security Administration. If his local office were to be closed, he noted, he might have to coordinate with a caretaker or family member to take him 100 miles to Raleigh for administrative hearings on his benefits; scheduling appointments, already extremely difficult, would become almost impossible. “It would be a nightmare for all of us,” he said.

That nightmare is now on its way to becoming a reality in White Plains, New York, the site of one of the agency’s hearing offices on DOGE’s list of closures. According to a letter that New York Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand recently sent to the Social Security Administration, the White Plains office, which serves beneficiaries across seven counties, currently has more than 2,000 cases pending. Starting in May, elderly and disabled people across the region will have to travel up to 135 miles to the next-closest office, which for some of them will be in another state.

“Does the Administration have plans to close additional SSA offices?” Gillibrand asked.

The Social Security Administration declined to respond to a detailed list of questions about DOGE’s recent efforts at the agency, including the 10 office closures and staffing reductions. A spokesperson did provide a brief statement on the White Plains situation, saying that the agency had been informed by the General Services Administration that the White Plains office’s lease would not be renewed and that there are no plans to replace the office. Many hearings will take place online through video and audio, the spokesperson said.

DOGE’s capture of the Social Security Administration began this week when Trump elevated to acting commissioner a low-level official named Leland Dudek.

In a since-deleted LinkedIn post, Dudek acknowledged that he had been surreptitiously feeding information to DOGE before his promotion. “I confess,” he wrote. “I helped DOGE understand SSA. I mailed myself publicly accessible documents and explained them to DOGE… I confess. I bullied agency executives, shared executive contact information, and circumvented the chain of command to connect DOGE with the people who get stuff done.” He added: “Everything I have ever done is in service to our country, our beneficiaries, and our agency.”

After Dudek was put in charge of the agency, he told staff that he hoped to reassure them that “our continuing priority is paying beneficiaries the right amount at the right time, and providing other critical services people rely on from us.” He also rebutted some of Musk’s claims regarding widescale Social Security fraud.

In a separate meeting, he told Trump administration officials and congressional staffers that one of his new ideas is to “outsource” the jobs of Social Security Administration call center employees, The Wall Street Journal reported late this week.

Still, DOGE has proceeded more carefully with firings and layoffs at the Social Security Administration than it has at other agencies. Whereas aviation safety and nuclear security specialists, veterans affairs staff and firefighters, medical researchers and many others have all been forced out of their jobs by DOGE in recent weeks, it wasn’t until this Thursday that a much smaller number of recently hired or recently promoted Social Security staff started receiving emails saying that their jobs were not “mission critical.” According to emails shared with ProPublica, these staff members had eight hours to decide if they wanted to request another job within the agency, likely at lower pay and in another city (such a job would not be guaranteed, and relocation expenses would not be covered).

These emails appear to have gone out largely to Social Security Administration policy staff and lawyers, including those who help administrative law judges write decisions in disability cases — decisions that may now take longer and potentially have more errors in them as a result, one agency official told ProPublica. “Claimants will have adverse effects in terms of delay and also losing benefits that they might otherwise be entitled to,” said the official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of retaliation. Social Security disability cases already have huge backlogs at the hearing stage, often taking more than a year.

Still, notably, employees “serving the public directly,” like those in field offices, were spared from these layoffs, at least for now.

That said, staff at Social Security’s regional offices around the country were not listed as “mission critical,” reflecting a further misunderstanding on DOGE’s part of what disabled people in particular need from the agency, legal aid attorneys in multiple states told ProPublica. When a low-income SSI or SSDI recipient has a problem that a front-line rep at a field office can’t explain or fix, or is just too overloaded with cases to deal with, it is regional staff who can help resolve the situation. When a person with an intellectual disability doesn’t understand why their benefits are being cut off or why they haven’t received notices in the mail about their case, regional staff can look through the case file and figure out what to do.

Regional staff do not yet appear to have been affected by DOGE’s layoffs, but many are now feeling on edge. One regional team leader, who also spoke anonymously for fear of retaliation, said that “nobody knows how the RIF [Reduction in Force] is going to work” in the coming days, weeks and months. Offices could be closed at the same time that remote staff are ordered to return to an office, creating a situation in which some SSA employees will face multiple-hour commutes each way every day, all but forcing them to leave their jobs and thus stop serving beneficiaries.

“We think that’s the plan, so that they don’t have to explicitly do as many layoffs” at an agency as popular and heretofore untouchable as the Social Security Administration, said Jessica LaPointe, a council president for the American Federation of Government Employees. LaPointe represents Social Security’s field office and teleservice workers.

That’s not to mention the attrition that could result from the low morale that has been spreading across Social Security Administration employees’ Signal threads and blogs this week; the agency is already the most overworked and demoralized of nearly any across the federal government, surveys of federal workers have found.

“And meanwhile the beneficiary ranks just keep exploding,” the regional team leader said. (The number of Social Security recipients has grown by over 13 million since 2010, as Baby Boomers surge into retirement.)

Even maintaining level staffing, several Social Security experts told ProPublica, would, in population-adjusted terms, amount to a major reduction in the program’s ability to provide benefits and services to its clients.

Martin O’Malley, a Democrat who was commissioner of the Social Security Administration from December 2023 to November 2024 and also previously served as governor of Maryland, told ProPublica that he believes this week marked just the start of what might be a long four years for Social Security. “The American people through a lifetime of work earn not only these benefits but the customer service necessary to process these benefits,” he said. “Their money went to that, too.”

Trump and Musk “are going to break the largest, most important social program in America,” O’Malley predicted — even if they have to do so gradually.

In recent years, the Social Security Administration along with the U.S. Digital Service were working to make it simpler for people with disabilities to apply for Social Security benefits. Officials conducted surveys of poor, elderly and disabled SSI applicants about what would make the process less burdensome, and they then began creating a simplified application — with plain-language questions and some pre-populated answers — that would eventually be available to complete on paper, by phone or online.

The goal was to reduce the time that applicants spend applying for benefits as well as the time that agency staff spend processing those applications. Or, in other words: government efficiency.

Yet these efforts have been slowed now that Trump has renamed the U.S. Digital Service the U.S. Department of Government Efficiency Service.

“In conversations with regular people about how Social Security could be more efficient, they usually say that they want more staff on the phone lines and taking appointments, and more office locations, so that they don’t have to wait 60 days after their spouse or parent died, or wait for months after developing a life-changing disability,” said Romig of the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. “Right now we’re hearing all these generalities about the government being too big, rather than a focus on individual people trying to access services from that government.”

Which of these philosophies the Social Security Administration adheres to for the remainder of Trump’s time in office will depend in part on which is embraced by Frank Bisignano, Trump’s nominee to become the permanent agency commissioner, who will replace Dudek once confirmed by the Senate. Bisignano’s attitude toward Social Security, its staffing, its regional and field offices, and its customer service hasn’t yet fully come into focus. He hasn’t yet been questioned at a confirmation hearing.

What is known about Bisignano is that he’s an experienced finance executive who oversees a $20 billion company. And that during his time as CEO of Fiserv, the payment-processing giant, his company generated savings by closing about a hundred locations and terminating thousands of employees, providing them with the opportunity to apply for other roles.

This content originally appeared on ProPublica and was authored by by Eli Hager.

Fifteen artists have been selected as the inaugural beneficiaries of NZ On Air’s New Music Pan-Asian funding.

The initiative, the first of its kind, aims to support the Asian music community in New Zealand.

The fund was established due to a lack of equitable representation of Asian musicians in the country’s music sector, says Teresa Patterson, head of music at NZ On Air.

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“Our Music Diversity Report clearly showed the under-representation of Pan-Asian New Zealand musicians in the Aotearoa music sector,” she said.

“This is reflected in the number of funding applications we received for this focus round.”

The funding provides musicians with up to $10,000 for recording, mixing and mastering a single, some of which can be set aside for the promotion and creation of visual content to accompany the song’s release.

“We received 107 applications for 15 grants, which is outstanding,” Patterson said.

‘Wonderful range’
“The range of genre, gender and ethnicity among the applicants was wonderful. We received applications from artists who identify as Chinese, Indian, Filipino, South Korean, Japanese, Indonesian, Sri Lankan, Malaysian, Thai and Iraqi.

“The genres varied from alternative/indie and pop to hip-hop/RnB, dance/electro and folk/country.”

Six of the 15 songs that secured funding are bilingual, featuring Asian languages such as Cantonese, Korean, Japanese, Malay and Punjabi.

Patterson believed this variety would “really help to reflect the many voices of Aotearoa New Zealand” and add to the vibrant cultural music mix experienced by local audiences.

Swap Gomez, a drummer, visual director and academic lecturer, was one of the panel members responsible for selecting the musicians for the funding. He emphasised the challenges faced by Asian musicians in New Zealand.

“What was awesome to see was so many Pan-Asian artists applying; artists we had never heard of coming out of the woodwork now that a space has been created to celebrate their work,” Gomez said.

“This is the time we can celebrate those Pan-Asian artists who have previously felt overlooked by the wider industry.

“Now there is an environment and sector where they can feel appreciated for their success in music. As a multicultural industry, developing initiatives such as this one is more crucial than ever.”

NZ On Air has announced that funding opportunities for Asian musicians will continue in the next financial year.

“The response we have had to this inaugural NZ On Air New Music Pan-Asian focus funding round has been phenomenal,” Patterson said.

“It tells us that there is a real need, so NZ On Air is excited to confirm that it will return in the new financial year.”

The full NZ On Air’s Pan-Asian New Music recipient list:

• Amol; cool asf
• Charlotte Avery; just before you go
• Crystal Chen; love letter
• hanbee; deeper
• Hans.; Porcelain
• Hugo Chan; bite
• Julius Black; After You
• LA FELIX; Waiting
• Lauren Gin; Don’t Stop
• Memory Foam; Moon Power
• Phoebe Rings; 아스라이
• RESHMA; Kuih Lapis (Layer Cake)
• tei.; sabre
• Terrible Sons; Thank You, Thank You
• Valere; Lily’s March

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.

Twenty four Pacific peoples have been recognised in the 2023 New Year’s honours.

A former Premier of Niue, Young Vivian, leads the list of distinguished Pacific peoples in the list.

Vivian has been made an officer of the New Zealand Order of Merit for his services to Niue.

• READ MORE: The full NZ New Year honours list

Fiji-born Dr Api Talemaitoga, a familiar face to Pacific communities during the height of covid-19 in Aotearoa, has been acknowledged for his decades of service in the medical sector.

The first Pacific priest ordained in Rome in 1990, Father Paulo Filoialii of Samoa, has been recognised for services to the Pacific community.

Also on the honours list is Lisa Taouma, the producer and director of Coconet TV, the largest pool of Pacific content on screen in New Zealand.

And the lead singer of the popular band Ardijah, Betty-Anne Monga, has been recognised for services to music.

‘Better things will come’: Niue’s Young Vivian
Young Vivian started his career as a teacher in New Zealand.

He went to a British school based on an English system. He failed English and was told to leave because enrolments were backed up.

He said he “begged the education officer” to stay so he was sent to Northland College and was “very happy” there.

Community members say he has been instrumental in fostering a love for Vagahau Niue, or Niue language, as a respected elder.

Speaking to RNZ Pacific reporter Lydia Lewis in 2022, at the launch of the Niue language app in Auckland, Vivian said:

“A language is a key to your culture and your tradition. It gives you that spiritual strength of who you are and you are able to face the world,” he said.

“That’s very, very important to a small nation like Niue who has a population of only 2500 people, but here in Australia and New Zealand it’s 80,000.”

When he went home to Niue, he was “dissatisfied”.

“I want to be fully independent, but I could see signs that people were not acceptable to that so I gave up, only then we can be real Niueans,” Vivian said.

His message to Pacific leaders is to believe in themselves.

“They must depend on themselves and God, they have everything in their homes, they need guts, stickability and determination, small as they are, they can stand up to it.”

He encourages the next generation to go back to basics.

“You have to depend on literally what you’ve got,” he said.

‘Profound privilege’: Dr Api
Dr Api Talemaitoga has been acknowledged for his decades-long work in the medical sector.

“I see it as a profound privilege, I have this knowledge about health and I find it a real pleasure to do it.”

More than three decades in the job after graduating in 1986, he has a deep sense of pride for the next generation.

“I was really fortunate to be given the opportunity to give the graduation address at the University of Otago for medical students,” he said.

“To see the highest number of Pasifika medical students walk across the stage was really emotional.

“I can happily retire now that I see this new generation of young people, enthusiastic, bright, diverse and they are the ones that will carry on the load in the future.”

Dr Talemaitoga always has a smile on his face and an infectious laugh, he is incredibly hard to get hold of because he is always helping his patients.

When asked how he keeps his charisma day in day out, he said:

“I am not superhuman, some days are just dreadful and you come home feeling really disillusioned and what’s the point of all of this when you see three or four people in a row heading for dialysis,” he said.

“Then you have days where you make a difference to one person out of the 25 or 30 you see that day.

“They feel really encouraged that you’ve been able for the first time to explain their condition to them … you can’t put it in words, it’s such an amazing feeling.”

‘This is for you, not me’: Father Paulo
The first Pacific Priest ordained in Rome in 1990 – Father Paulo Sagato Filoialii is dedicating his medal to the community he has served for decades, that has in turn backed him.

“I want to offer this medal for the Pacific Island people, this is for you, not for me. This medal I will receive is for all of you and I thank you all for your prayers, for your love and your support, God bless you all,” he said.

Father Paulo has contributed his time to the Catholic community in Christchurch and Ashburton.

Upon Father Filoialii being ordained, the Samoan Mass was performed for the first time in the Vatican, resulting in Pope John Paul II decreeing that the Samoan Mass can now be performed anywhere in the world.

‘Proud’: The Coconet TV’s Lisa Taouma
Pioneering Pasifika producer and director Lisa Taouma paved the way for Pacific peoples in media.

She created the ground-breaking site The Coconet TV which is the largest pool of Pacific content on screen in Aotearoa.

On top of that she made the Polyfest series, the long-standing Pacific youth series Fresh, five award-winning documentaries, the feature film Teine Sa and two short films.

Taouma believes you are only as good as the people you bring through.

“I’m proud of having brought Pacific stories to the fore around the world, I am proud of having brought Pacific people with me into that space, that is what I am most proud of,” She said.

Taouma said it was awesome that more indigenous people were being recognised globally.

While she is humbled to receive the honour, she admits not accepting it crossed her mind.

“I felt quite conflicted at the start, you know there are problems with the idea of empire and how Pacific people have been treated under the history of the British Empire,” she said.

“At the same time, it is really important to stand in this space as a Pacific woman and to have more Pacific people recognised by the Crown if you like.

“This is a system that is hopefully more reflective of Aotearoa and where we stand now.”

‘I never looked back’: Sully Paea
Niuean youth-worker Sully Paea has dedicated his life to working with youth, founding the East Tamaki Youth and Resource Centre between the late 1970s and 1986.

Paea said he was lost. He battled alcoholism and pushed through a diagnosis of depression. He had a violent criminal career until he met his wife which changed him completely.

He has dedicated his life to working with youth, founding the East Tamaki Youth and Resource Centre between the late 1970s and 1986.

After 40 years serving the community, he has never looked back

‘We’re getting there as people’: Tafilau Nina Kirifi-Alai
Tafilau Nina Kirifi-Alai has been honoured for her great services to Pacific Development.

Kirifi-Alai has been the Pacific manager of Otago University for more than 20 years.

She has assisted scholarships of Pacific students and has led developments for the University of Otago to support Pacific tertiary institutions in the region.

“Seeing Pasifika communities graduating from university has been rewarding,” she said.

“To see all those colours in the garments and all those families and all that, was like oh yeah we are getting there, we’re getting there as a people. This is why we left our homes to seek greater opportunities, education wise and work wise, and I actually believe that education is the key.”

‘Knowing your culture, knowing your roots’: Rosanna Raymond
Activism is what paved the road for multidisciplinary artist and curator Rosanna Raymond.

Her work has taken her to China, Australia and Britain, where she has built an awareness of Pacific art and fashion.

She draws on her strong cultural bond to artefacts that were taken from their original land and are now displayed in museums throughout the world.

She made a huge written contribution by co-publishing Pasifika Styles: Artists inside the Museum in 2008 and was Honorary Research Associate at the Department of Anthropology and Institute of Archaeology at University College, London.

She said moving forward whilst staying true to several of her roots was what led her to where she was today.

The full list of Pasifika in the New Year’s Honours list are:

To be Companions of the New Zealand Order of Merit:
The honourable Mititaiagimene Young Vivian, former Premier of Niue – For services to Niue.

To be Officers of the New Zealand Order of Merit:
Nathan Edward Fa’avae – For services to adventure racing, outdoor education and the Pacific community

David Rodney Fane – For services to the performing arts

Dr Apisalome Sikaidoka Talemaitoga – For services to health and the Pacific community

Lisa-Jane Taouma – For services to Pacific arts and the screen industry

To be Members of the New Zealand Order of Merit:
Father Paulo Sagato Filoialii – For services to the Pacific community

Sefita ‘Alofi Hao’uli – For services to Tongan and Pacific communities

Lakiloko Tepae Keakea – For services to Tuvaluan art

Marilyn Rhonda Kohlhase – For services to Pacific arts and education

Felorini Ruta McKenzie – For services to Pacific education

Betty-Anne Maryrose Monga – For services to music

Sullivan Luao Paea – For services to youth

Rosanna Marie Raymond – For services to Pacific art

The Queen’s Service Medal:
Kinaua Bauriri Ewels – For services to the Kiribati community

Galumalemana Fetaiaimauso Marion Galumalemana – For services to the Pacific community

Hana Melania Halalele – For services to Pacific health

Teurukura Tia Kekena – For services to the Cook Islands and Pacific communities

Nanai Pati Muaau – For services to Pacific health

Lomia Kaipati Semaia Naniseni – For services to the Tokelau community

Ma’a Brian Sagala – For services to Pacific communities

Mamaitaloa Sagapolutele – For services to education and the Pacific community

Honorary:
Tofilau Nina Kirifi-Alai – For services to education and the Pacific community

Tuifa’asisina Kasileta Maria Lafaele – For services to Pacific health

Nemai Divuluki Vucago – For services to Fijian and Pacific communities

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ. 

This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.

Social Security was on the ballot in Georgia's December 6 run-off election.

It's bad news for the Wall Street-backed politicians who are determined to reach into our pockets and steal our hard earned benefits.

Senator Reverend Raphael Warnock's re-election victory there should be good news for Gold Star families, paralyzed veterans, seniors, and indeed all of Social Security's over 65 million beneficiaries.

It's bad news for the Wall Street-backed politicians who are determined to reach into our pockets and steal our hard earned benefits.

Defeated Republican nominee Herschel Walker proudly campaigned with and took money from Senator Rick Scott (R-FL), the author of a plan that would put Social Security on the chopping block every five years.

Walker would have been a rubber stamp for this plan—and others that would be even worse.

Senator Ron Johnson's (R-WI) plan would put Social Security on the chopping block every single year. The Republican Study Committee, a group that counts about 75 percent of House Republicans as members, wants to raise the retirement age to 70, slash middle class benefits, and give billions of Social Security dollars to Wall Street and private insurance corporations.

Republican House Leader Kevin McCarthy, who will be House Speaker next year, says he will take a must-pass debt limit bill hostage to cut our earned Social Security benefits. Senator John Thune (R-SD), the No. 2 Senate Republican leader, has endorsed the same approach—and would have had Walker's support.

As a self-funded program that has no borrowing authority and can only pay benefits if it has sufficient revenue, Social Security does not add one penny to the federal debt. Nevertheless, these Republicans want to cut our earned benefits so badly, they're willing to risk an economic catastrophe by defaulting on our obligations.

Warnock's victory gives Democrats a clear majority in the Senate. Along with President Biden, most of these lawmakers are committed to expanding Social Security—with no cuts—while requiring the wealthiest to begin to pay their fair share.

Social Security embodies the best of our values: that all human beings deserve dignity, freedom, and independence, that hard work should be rewarded, and that we are all connected, sharing the same risks and benefits.

Social Security is as reliable as it is essential. Through pandemics, wars, and economic recessions, Social Security has always continued to reliably pay monthly benefits, allowing its beneficiaries and their families to pay rent, buy food, and fill life-saving prescriptions.

Americans of all political backgrounds rely on our earned Social Security benefits, and fortunately Warnock supports protecting and expanding them.

As a member of the Senate Aging Committee, Warnock led the successful fight to cap the cost of insulin for seniors. He was part of the winning vote to finally allow Medicare to negotiate with Big Pharma to lower drug prices.

With his re-election, Warnock and his Democratic colleagues have a mandate to protect Social Security's earned benefits. They must not only oppose cuts—they must also refuse to negotiate benefits with the extremists who plan to take the debt limit hostage.

To avoid a dangerous and potentially calamitous game of chicken, Democrats should thwart the kidnappers by raising or eliminating the debt ceiling before the end of this year. That will foil the right-wing plan to force highly unpopular and unwise Social cuts that voters across America resoundingly rejected this year.

This content originally appeared on Common Dreams - Breaking News & Views for the Progressive Community and was authored by Nancy J. Altman.

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We’re excited to announce the 25 recipients of the 2022 ProPublica student conference stipend. Our seventh annual stipend program received additional support from The Pudding, an online visual essays publication.

This year’s recipients were chosen from more than 125 applicants. Each of these talented journalists will receive a $750 stipend to attend a virtual or in-person conference in 2022.

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We’ve written about what ProPublica is doing to increase the diversity of our newsroom and of the broader journalism community. This stipend program is part of our ongoing efforts and will help make it easier for journalists from underrepresented communities to take advantage of everything these conferences offer.

Here are this year’s recipients:

Anjali Huynh is a junior at Emory University majoring in political science and sociology. She is a digital politics intern at NBC News and executive editor of Emory’s student publication, The Emory Wheel, overseeing the news and diversity, equity and inclusion sections. Huynh is a member of the Asian American Journalists Association, the National Lesbian and Gay Journalists Association and the South Asian Journalists Association, and she hopes to spend her career examining the intersection of race and policy. She will intern for The Boston Globe’s metro section this summer.

Brandon Yam is a first-year student at Hamilton College, where he is majoring in cultural anthropology and minoring in education studies. He covered the New York City public school system at the FLHS News, his high school paper, and at the “Miseducation” podcast. He has interned at City Limits and “Miseducation.” Now he covers news and features at The Spectator, Hamilton College’s paper. Outside of school, he has tutored his cousin in English and a sophomore in geometry. His tutoring has shaped his journalism. After graduation, he hopes to continue to investigate how race and class intersect with education. Yam will be attending IRE and AAJA.

Chasity Hale is a journalism master’s student at Stanford University, where she also received her bachelor’s degree in communication and creative writing. She has interned at NPR Music, worked at The Stanford Daily and written for various publications, including The San Franciscan magazine and Peninsula Press. Raised in Miami, Hale is intimately aware of the dangers that climate change poses to coastal cities and is passionate about reporting on the environment through the lenses of equity and justice. She plans to attend the Journalism and Women Symposium in Austin, Texas, this September.

Citlali Perez is a writer and artist based on the South Side of Chicago. She is a junior at DePaul University studying sociology and journalism and works with community-based organizations on immigrant rights issues. She has written for the bilingual student-run publication at DePaul and other outlets covering politics and culture in Chicago. She hopes to develop her investigative reporting skills and contribute to the work being done by movement journalists. She would like to attend NLGJA, IRE and the Latino Media Summit.

Iqra Salah is a first-year student at the University of California, Berkeley, Graduate School of Journalism, where she is majoring in documentary filmmaking while also pursuing investigative journalism. She is also a student researcher with the Investigative Reporting Program at UC Berkeley. Previously, she worked as a reporter and researcher for the BBC in Nairobi, Kenya, where she covered important issues across Africa. Salah has also worked with CNN as a field producer and helped cover the 2017 Kenyan elections, as well as with Africa Uncensored, Kenya’s first independent investigative media house, as a reporter. She will be attending IRE and the National Association of Black Journalists conference and convention.

Janat Kaur Batra is a senior at Georgia Tech pursuing a bachelor’s in literature, media and communication. She is an editorial research intern at CNN and the editor in chief of the Technique, Georgia Tech’s student newspaper. Batra is also an alumna of the 2021 Dow Jones News Fund digital media class. Through DJNF, Batra interned at the International Center for Journalists with its communications team. Her journalism experience also includes freelancing for The New York Times by reporting on her community in Atlanta. She is passionate about covering inequities in the criminal justice system and aims to work on an investigative team in the future. Batra will be attending the AAJA national convention this summer and potentially IRE.

Jason White is a Native American photojournalist based in Phoenix. He attends Arizona State University and is working toward a degree in photography. His passion for photography started in high school, where he slowly started learning about journalism and what impacts it has on the world. After the experience he gained in high school, he immediately sought out the local campus publication when moving off to college. From then on, White has gained experience from all over, learning from local journalists as well as his fellow student journalists. White’s true passion is conflict photography, as it is unpredictable and hard to navigate, but that’s exactly what keeps drawing him back. He plans to attend the Native American Journalists Association conference.

Javier Sarmiento is an Afro-Latino writer from Harlem in New York City. He is a senior at Buena Vista University studying digital media and writing about sports and social justice topics as a staff writer for The Tack Online. Sarmiento won first place in the collegiate sports writing category of the Robert L. Vann Media Awards for his article “The Impact and Influence of LeBron James.” Last summer, he was selected to be a part of the NABJ’s Student Multimedia Project and produced two articles pertaining to race in the teaching and book industries. Sarmiento plans to attend NABJ, the National Association of Hispanic Journalists conference and the Online News Association conference.

Jordan Allen is a junior in digital/print journalism with a minor in criminal justice at the University of North Texas. Allen has been passionate about her future career in journalism since she was in elementary school. She has grown her skills in communication, teamwork and professional journalism writing by working with UNT’s broadcast and newspaper department and as a chapter ambassador for UNT-NABJ. Allen will be attending NABJ.

Julian Berger is a journalism student at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and a prime-time show intern at CNN. During the summer of 2021, Berger interned at NBC News working as a production assistant for NBC News NOW. In 2020, he worked as a reporter for the Spanish-language newspaper La Noticia covering the Latino community in North Carolina. Berger is a member of NAHJ and co-founded the group’s student chapter at UNC in 2020. After graduation in May, he plans to pursue a career in broadcast journalism. Berger will be attending NAHJ or the Latino Media Summit.

Julietta Bisharyan is a multimedia and investigative journalist from the Bay Area. As a first-generation Armenian American, she is committed to reporting on local and human rights issues. She hopes to tell the stories of communities whose voices are often ignored and to provoke change. Her work has been published in Berkeleyside, Armenian Weekly, East Bay Times and the Davis Enterprise. She is currently earning her master’s degree at the University of California, Berkeley, Graduate School of Journalism after graduating from UC Davis. Bisharyan will be attending the ONA conference and the Journalism and Women Symposium.

Manuel Cuéllar is a Colombian journalist and documentary filmmaker based in Brooklyn, New York. He began his career in Buenos Aires, Argentina, where he produced weekly programs about culture, music and sports for national television. Upon moving to New York, Cuéllar worked for four years at Soledad O'Brien Productions, developing and producing content for documentary series. He is now pursuing a master’s degree in bilingual journalism with a documentary specialization at the Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism at CUNY. Cuéllar currently works as a freelance associate producer for a bilingual cancer survivor podcast and is developing a documentary series about music in different immigrant communities around New York and their connection to Latin America. Cuéllar will be attending either NAHJ or a documentary conference.

Marielle Argueza was born in the Philippines and raised in California. She attends the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism as a Toni Stabile investigative fellow. Before pursuing a master’s degree, she was a local reporter for the Monterey County Weekly. She has won several awards from the California News Publishers Association for her reporting on education. She plans to attend the Investigative Reporters and Editors conference.

McKenzie Allen-Charmley is a Dena’ina Athabaskan and Black journalist from Anchorage, Alaska. She is a senior studying journalism and mass communication at Arizona State University. It is her mission to help create the foundation of a journalistic evolution that values representation, authenticity and accuracy above all else. McKenzie is also a broadcast reporter for Cronkite News/Arizona PBS as well as a fellow for both NAJA and PlanetForward for 2021-22. She has previously worked for CNBC and the city of Phoenix, and she was also a fellow for the Henry Luce Foundation reporting on underserved Indigenous communities. She will attend NAJA.

Miranda Muir is a high school senior and co-editor in chief of the La Quinta High student news outlet, the Hawkview, in the Coachella Valley. For the past four years, she has covered local politics and school news, written feature stories, and focused on localizing issues important to her community. Recently, Muir helped the Hawkview pitch a Humans of New York-style printed banner project to her city, titled Humans of LQHS, in hopes of making stories of those in her community physically visible. She plans to continue to pursue journalism in various forms moving forward into college, to hold those in power accountable and to amplify the voices of others. Muir will be attending ONA.

Natalia Sánchez Loayza is an award-winning Peruvian journalist, editor and writer. She is a master's candidate in bilingual journalism at the Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism at CUNY. Additionally, she holds an MFA in creative writing in Spanish from New York University. She focuses her journalistic work on gender inequality, labor issues and reproductive rights. Her reporting on the labor conditions of domestic workers in Peru received a grant from Oxfam FNPI and the Fundación Gabriel García Márquez. She worked as assistant editor for Etiqueta Negra magazine, and she’s co-founder and co-editor of various female-led media projects. In 2021, she won the Aura Estrada international literary award for a nonfiction book project described by one of Mexico’s leading newspapers as “a deeper reflection on how painful spaces and experiences in Latin America build identity.” She also received a 2021 scholarship from the Association of Foreign Correspondents in the U.S. She is based in Brooklyn and will be attending IRE or NAHJ.

Natalie Skowlund is a graduate student at the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication at Arizona State University. As a Southwest health reporting fellow at ASU, Natalie conducts research and reports on health disparities. Recently, she has covered mental health in Indigenous communities as a mental health journalism fellow with the Carter Center and teenage migration in Tapachula, Mexico, as part of the Cronkite Borderlands Initiative. Previously, Skowlund worked as an education reporter for the Grants Pass Daily Courier and interned with NPR-affiliate WDAV. She is also a Fulbright scholar who has lived in Colombia, Taiwan, Spain and Bolivia. Her work has appeared in the Portland Tribune and Indian Country Today, among other publications. She is fluent in Spanish and proficient in Mandarin Chinese. Skowlund aspires to be a bilingual audio journalist and will attend the NLGJA conference.

Oden Taylor is a third-year journalism student, transferring to Cal Poly Humboldt in the fall of 2022. He aspires to amplify underrepresented voices and hold authority figures accountable through fair and ethical reporting, focusing heavily on equity issues for LGBTQ+ people and people of color. Taylor is also currently a fellow with CalMatters College Journalism Network and plans to attend the NLGJA conference.

Shi En Kim is a final-year doctoral student in molecular engineering at the University of Chicago who is transitioning into full-time science journalism. Her freelance work has appeared in National Geographic, Scientific American, Slate, Science News, Hakai Magazine and others. She was a 2021 AAAS mass media fellow at Smithsonian magazine and an editorial intern at Popular Science in the spring of 2022. Currently, she’s an early-career fellow with The Open Notebook/Burroughs Wellcome Fund. She’s forever grateful for the opportunity to interview bigwigs such as NASA astronaut Chris Cassidy, American Olympic figure skater Mirai Nagasu and Dr. Anthony Fauci for her articles. She plans to attend IRE and AAJA.

Simon J. Levien is a second-year history major at Harvard College from Sparta, New Jersey. He has worn many hats at The Crimson, serving at times as senior staff writer, magazine reporter, photographer, newsletters editor, social media director and diversity committee member. Currently he leads its metro coverage, serves as audience engagement editor and still writes occasionally for Fifteen Minutes, The Crimson’s magazine. Last year, Levien was the youngest member in his cohort in The New York Times Student Journalism Institute. He believes strongly in the power of historically informed investigative journalism and digital strategy pioneered by nonprofit newsrooms. Levien would like to attend AAJA and IRE.

Stephania Rodríguez is a bilingual journalism student at DePaul University. Based in Chicago, she currently covers local news, but she has a particular interest in topics concerning social justice. She hopes to one day become a recognized investigative reporter whose work will promote positive change. She plans to attend the Latino Media Summit.

Tamia Fowlkes is a University of Wisconsin-Madison senior majoring in journalism and political science. She’s currently an intern for “The Rachel Maddow Show” on MSNBC and News 3 Now in Madison. On campus, she serves as an Andrew Goodman ambassador for the Andrew Goodman Foundation and as a video production intern for University Communications. She is a student representative for NABJ and has written for the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, the Wisconsin State Journal, Isthmus and The Madison Commons. She co-hosts the podcast “Pod-Cast Your Vote,” which aims to mobilize and empower youth voters. In the fall, Fowlkes will continue her studies at Columbia Journalism School, where she is pursuing her master’s. She hopes to attend IRE and ONA in September.

Tasha Sandoval is a Colombian and Cuban American writer and journalist based in New York City. She started pursuing journalism at the Bogotá Post, an English language outlet in Colombia, after six years of working in higher education and international admissions. She has a bachelor’s in history from Bowdoin College and a master’s in educational leadership and policy studies from Boston University. She is currently a bilingual master’s student at the Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism at CUNY, where she is specializing in audio journalism. She is a spring 2022 intern for Univision’s El Detector, the first Spanish-language fact-checking platform in the U.S. She plans to attend the NLGJA conference.

Tia Knowles is a multimedia journalist from Durham, North Carolina. She attends North Carolina Central University and is a rising senior. She is a mass communications major with a concentration in broadcast media. Currently, she works as a reporter for Central News, a student-run newscast at the university. She is involved with a variety of organizations at her school: the Broadcast Education Association, Lambda Pi Eta and NABJ. After graduation she plans to work in broadcast journalism. She intends to use her platform to provide proper representation as an African American woman in journalism. She will be attending the NABJ convention.

Uvie Bikomo is a Nigerian American graduate student at the Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism at CUNY. She earned her bachelor’s degree in journalism from Texas Tech University. She has dabbled in various aspects of media, from working as the content producer for a biweekly newscast to hosting a weekly radio show at a local station. After undergrad, she took a gap year in Nigeria where she worked as the producer/presenter/reporter for “Entertainment News” at Channels Television, the country’s leading 24-hour cable news station. She hopes to create a magazine that bridges the gap between Africa and the Black diaspora. She plans to attend the NABJ convention.

This content originally appeared on Articles and Investigations - ProPublica and was authored by by Adriana Gallardo, Ash Ngu and Mollie Simon.