Five California Journos Given Fellowships to Cover the Elderly

Five California journos were among the 16 selected for this years MetLife Foundation Journalists in Aging Fellows Program, which supports journalism focused on aging and elderly issues. La Opiñon's Araceli Martinez Ortega will develop a series on Latino Social Security recipients, especially those with incarcerated children. RedwoodAge.com's Pamela MacLean will work on a series about mental health issues in aging Boomers, and the Gen Xers that will need to take care of them. Caring.com senior editor Paula Spencer Scott will create a 5-part series on "caregiver syndrome." Nadia Maiwandi will explore the plight of elderly women from South Asia. And finally Vanessa White will author a series called "Ethnic Minority Depression: Vietnamese American Community Focus." Also among this year's fellows is former Village Voice investigative reporter James Ridgeway. Full list of fellows after the jump: Azadeh Ansari (assignment editor/writer, CNN International, Atlanta, Ga.) will produce a video documentary story with written website postings on the struggles of elderly Iraqi Arab and Christian refugees in America, mainly in Dearborn, MI. She was on the CNN team that earned a 2011 Peabody Award for covering the BP oil spill. Hanah Cho (reporter/blogger, Baltimore Sun, Baltimore, Md.) will author "Drowning in Debt," a two-part series on the major financial crisis facing older Americans. Karla Gómez Escamilla (reporter/anchor, Univision Arizona, Tucson, Ariz.) will produce a series of reports on immigration challenges for Latino seniors. Kerry Hannon (author/columnist/ broadcaster, Forbes and AARP, Washington, D.C.) will produce a series of three articles on work and retirement of the boomer generation. Kay Harvey (independent journalist, MinnPost, Woodbury, Minn.), a former reporter on aging for the St. Paul Pioneer Press, will write a four-part series on the economic insecurity and health challenges of aging Minnesotans. Jongwon Lee (editor, Korea Daily Atlanta, Atlanta, Ga.) will publish a three-part series on the strain of American traditional ways felt by elders in extended families, especially with family crowding in the current housing crisis. Pamela MacLean (senior writer, RedwoodAge.com, Larkspur, Calif.) will produce three multimedia articles on mental health issues awaiting aging boomers and their Generation X children. The veteran legal issues reporter will a focus on such developments as diagnostic changes that may affect insurance coverage; uncertain availability of mental health facilities; and legal and law-enforcement concerns, such as protecting mentally incapacitated elders from fraud. Nadia Maiwandi (community and events editor, India Currents Magazine, San Jose, Calif.) will explore the plight of elderly immigrant women from South Asia, especially Afghanistan, who find themselves dependent on their families and the women who care for them, often while juggling multiple responsibilities both in and outside of their homes. Araceli Martinez Ortega (Sacramento correspondent, La Opiñon, Los Angeles, Calif.) will develop a series on the struggles of Latino elders living solely on Social Security, especially those who are parents of incarcerated children. Andrea Parrott (freelance writer, Twin Cities Daily Planet, Minneapolis, Minn.) will author a three-part series on Alzheimer's disease, with an emphasis on African American families. James Ridgeway (senior Washington correspondent, Mother Jones, Washington, D.C.), a documentary producer, author/co-author of 16 books, and former political editor of the Village Voice, will concentrate on the rising tide of aging prisoners, especially those aging in solitary confinement. Rebecca Rivas (staff reporter/video producer, St. Louis American, St. Louis, Mo.) will develop a three-part series on how social media and the Internet affect learning, isolation, and older-worker issues for older African Americans, such as a new breed of entrepreneurial grandmothers using online media to generate income for their families. Johanes Rosello (reporter, Mundo Hispanico, Norcross, Ga.) will produce a series on language and cultural barriers facing growing population of Latino elders in Georgia, where the Hispanic population has doubled in the last decade. Paula Spencer Scott (senior editor, Caring.com, Kensington, Calif.) will produce a five-part series on caregiver syndrome, including what caregivers can do to reduce their heightened risks to their physical and mental well-being, work, and relationships. Rochelle Sharpe (freelance reporter, New England Center for Investigative Reporting, Boston, Mass.) will investigate declining life expectancy for women in some low-income U.S. regions. Sharpe, who shared a 1991 Pulitzer Prize for National Reporting, is a former Wall Street Journal reporter and has written for the Boston Globe, Business Week, and many other publications. Vanessa White (contributing writer, Viễn Đông Daily News, Westminster, Calif.) will author a series titled, "Ethnic Minority Depression: Vietnamese American Community Focus."

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Five California Journos Given Fellowships to Cover the Elderly

Matthew Fleischer

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