Report for America journalists to cover economic mobility, immigrant communities in Miami

The Miami Herald and el Nuevo Herald newsrooms will be receiving two reporters this year as corps members of Report for America, a national service program that places talented emerging journalists in local newsrooms to tackle under-covered topics and communities in the United States.

Anna Jean Kaiser, who will be working with Miami Herald editors, will focus on the topic of economic mobility — an important issue in South Florida even before the COVID-19 pandemic — and its impact on the region’s economy and educational efforts.

Rose Monique Varela Henriquez will be working with the staff of el Nuevo Herald, focusing on daily-life issues within South Florida’s diverse Spanish-speaking communities. Beside Cuban Americans, Miami is home to hundreds of thousands of immigrants from the Americas, among them Venezuelans, Nicaraguans, Colombians, Mexicans, Guatemalans, Chileans and Argentines. Rose Monique will focus on all aspects of immigrant life in South Florida.

They will join Syra Ortiz-Blanes, who will begin her second year with el Nuevo Herald through Report for America. Ortiz-Blanes, who has been based in Puerto Rico during the pandemic, has focused her reporting on political and economic issues in the U.S. territory as well as political issues affecting Spanish-speaking residents of Puerto Rico and Florida during the 2020 election cycle.

The three Miami Herald and el Nuevo Herald Report for America corps members are among 300 journalists who will be placed with more than 200 local news organizations across 49 states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico and Guam.

Readers from both news outlets will benefit from the stories they produce.

Grants from Report for America — matched by the Miami Herald and el Nuevo Herald — enable each newsroom to add a reporter. In addition, el Nuevo Herald will extend the term of RFA corps member hired in 2020.

Kaiser comes to Miami from New York, where she is finishing a master’s in journalism at Columbia University, where she won a fellowship from the Overseas Press Club. Before seeking her master’s degree, she lived and worked for five years in Brazil as a freelance reporter, covering issues ranging from the World Cup and the Olympics to the Zika virus, President Dilma Rousseff’s impeachment and the deforestation of the Amazon rain forest. She handled assignments for the Associated Press, the Guardian, the BBC, the Washington Post and the New York Times.

“I’m so honored to have the opportunity to cover economic mobility in Dade County, an especially important and urgent beat in the wake of the pandemic, which has severely exacerbated inequality,’’ Kaiser said.” I’m looking forward to doing ambitious, impactful local journalism that captures the dynamism of South Florida.”

Varela Henriquez, who is from Puerto Rico and grew up living there and in the Dominican Republic, is a graduate of the University of Puerto Rico. She has worked at the Centro de Periodismo Investigativo, the Center for Investigative Journalism, in San Juan, where she participated in an investigation of the government’s lack of assistance to homeless people during the pandemic. She also reported on the relation between rents and crime rates on the streets of a neighborhood close to one of the biggest universities in Puerto Rico.

“Having been born and raised between two Caribbean islands, I have experienced first hand how different but intrinsically similar we Hispanics are. It has made me realize that now more than ever there’s an important need to have more Latinos in newsrooms throughout the United States. I’m honored for the opportunity to join el Nuevo Herald’s team as a Report for America corps member to support their efforts covering the Hispanic and immigrant communities of South Florida. I take with great responsibility the task to shed a light on the challenges affecting their people, as well as the milestones they achieve.”