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As part of IRE's 50th anniversary and spring member drive, we’re sharing some of the biggest moments in investigative journalism since 1975.
(April 8, 2025) — By the time Donald Barlett and James B. Steele published their landmark series on wealth inequality in 1991, they had already worked on a groundbreaking data project with Phil Meyer and won two Pulitzer Prizes for their investigative reporting.
But their nine-part Philadelphia Inquirer series “America: What went wrong?” was unique in that it captured — and questioned — the drastic transformation of an entire nation in real time. Barlett and Steele dug into how corporate greed and political deal-making over decades were contributing to the decline of America’s middle class.
They spoke about the series at the 1992 National Press Club luncheon.
During their remarks, Barlett noted that their colossal work started with a simple question: “What happened to the American worker?”
So, in 1989 and 1990, they traveled across the country and captured stories from a swath of middle-class Americans. A saw mill worker in Martell, California. A department store clerk in Charleston, West Virginia. A meat processing plant worker in Delia, Missouri. A middle-level manufacturing plant manager in Niles, Michigan. And on and on and on — until they noticed a pattern.
“We saw something we had never seen before in all the years in this business,” Barlett said. “The interviews were identical.”
Across the country, regardless of race, economic status, or college education, people were being increasingly forced to work lower-paying jobs, or losing their jobs altogether. They were losing health care benefits and pensions, or paying more for healthcare.
Digging into statistics helped them prove a story Americans are all too familiar with today: the country’s growing wealth gap and the shrinking middle class.
In those 1992 remarks, Steele goes on to note why the series struck a chord with readers across the country:
“It did so by using techniques and processes of journalism that supposedly nobody wants to read anymore,” Steele said. “This thing was long. 73,000 words in the original form. … It was filled with numbers. It dealt with the economy. Taxation. Fiscal policy. The federal deficit. All of these things that supposedly we hear over and over again that readers don't want to read about.”
“We believe people are capable of absorbing numbers, information of that sort,” Steele said. “But you can't just spew it out. You have to put it in some kind of a context.”
Monika Bauerlein, Chief Executive Officer of Mother Jones, reflected on the duo’s impact after the death of Barlett last year.
“When I started in journalism, smack in the middle of that early-’90s recession … Reporters exposed illegal acts, not ones that were merely unfair or inequitable,” Bauerlein wrote. “That’s what made Barlett and Steele’s reporting so unique, and so powerful. What happened to incomes in America was wrong, it was right there in the book title.
Not because it broke any laws (the point was that it was all perfectly legal!) but because it was unfair. Seeing that journalism could do that — could expose not just lawbreaking, but systemic injustice — was an aha moment for cub reporter me.”
Since the project, the duo went on to work together for more than 40 years. They also expanded on their original reporting, publishing another series with the Investigative Reporting Workshop in 2012 and an updated book, “America: What Went Wrong? The Crisis Deepens” in 2020.
After the 2012 series, they shared the following advice to journalists in an IRE contest entry:
“Try to take a long view of economic currents — not just what the latest quarterly data may show. Politicians, bureaucrats, corporate officials and special interests constantly misstate or gloss over complex issues, such as trade and taxes, by highlighting numbers that appear to support their position, when the data over the long term may give an entirely different picture. So go to the specific public documents to chart these trends for yourself. And always listen closely to people — what they see, hear or believe about the state of the economy. Quite often they have a better view of what’s going on than economists.”
The duo shared more tips for putting together an investigation at the 2009 IRE Conference in Baltimore. Listen to a recording of the session: Building the story: From getting started to knowing when to stop.
This recording has been made publicly available from the IRE Resource Center, which is home to thousands of journalism tipsheets, stories, audio recordings and other resources to help enhance your reporting. The Resource Center is available for free to IRE members, and it's just one of our many member benefits!
Learn more and join IRE today.
(April 7, 2025) — Would you like to help lead Investigative Reporters and Editors as a new member of the Board of Directors? Or help judge the IRE Awards as an elected member of the IRE Contest Committee?
Now is your chance! Six of 13 board seats are up for election in 2025, along with two seats on the Contest Committee.
The period to declare candidacy opened on April 1, and the deadline for candidates to file and submit election materials is May 6, 11:59 p.m. Central.
IRE member voting will begin June 3, and voting will close June 21. Election results will be announced the membership meeting at IRE25.
Click here to learn more about the board election process and how to run. Current membership in IRE is a requirement for all candidates.
As part of IRE's 50th anniversary and spring member drive, we’re sharing some of the biggest moments in investigative journalism since 1975.
(April 1, 2025) – Investigative journalism did not begin with Watergate, but it was a watershed moment for the field when a story about a D.C. burglary led to the resignation of a sitting president.
Len Downie Jr., an IRE founder and Watergate editor, saw the first story about the 1972 DNC headquarters break-in while he was in London for a fellowship. It didn’t scream “scandal” right away, but there was something strange unfolding. He recalled the series of events during the 2012 IRE Conference in Boston:
“I saw this odd story,” Downie said. “And I found the bylines on it odd.”
“Carl Bernstein, who had been at the paper for about as long as I had been, I was amazed he was still working there. ... And I had never heard of Bob Woodward because he had been hired while I was away on leave.”
When he returned to the newsroom, Downie played a major role in editing the Washington Post’s years-long coverage of Watergate.
Even though there was some questioning of authority during this time – especially after the Vietnam War and Pentagon Papers – Downie said political journalists were still shocked by Watergate. A conspiracy of this level seemed unfathomable.
“Within our own newsroom, there was skepticism,” Downie said. “… about what the paper was doing to itself by pursuing what looked like a silly, stupid story.”
For the next two years, they chased leads and reported on the burglary’s links to the White House and the Nixon reelection campaign, leaks from Deep Throat, the Senate Watergate hearings, the involvement of hush money and secret tapes, and the eventual resignation of President Nixon. See the timeline of events by The Washington Post.
Because of Watergate, investigative reporting became a key part of American journalism and culture.
The film depiction of Woodward and Bernstein’s book, “All the President’s Men,” emphasized the central tenets of investigative journalism: Knocking on doors. Finding documents. Following the money. Read more in Downie’s column for The Washington Post.
“The book itself is like a primer on basic reporting,” Bernstein told ABC News last year. “You see what's the most important decision we make as reporters? To go out at night and to visit people who work for Richard Nixon and his reelection in their homes, knock on their doors, have the doors you know, slammed in our faces, except for the few that didn't.”
It’s important to remember that raw perseverance of shoe-leather reporting. Woodward and Bernstein didn’t set out to oust a president; they were writing a story about a break-in that turned into so much more.
“It’s about fitting little pieces together,” Woodward told Roy J. Harris for the book Pulitzer’s Gold: A Century of Public Service Journalism. “You don’t know what you have when you publish a little piece, but you publish it anyway.”
Another impact of Watergate? More journalists and news organizations wanted to pursue investigations, but they didn't necessarily have the experience. That’s where IRE comes in.
In 1975, a group came together to form a national organization embodying the mission of investigative reporting, hoping to set standards and best practices in this growing field. They included Downie, Myrta Pulliam, Paul Williams, Les Whitten, among several others.
“It dawned on people that they don’t have to reinvent the wheel,” Pulliam told The IRE Journal in 2015. “They could help themselves and each other by sharing information and techniques."
In the interview with ABC News, Woodward and Bernstein also touched on the importance of working together.
“What it demonstrates is the power of collaboration,” Woodward said. “We learn in our personal lives you never do anything alone effectively. And it's the same with journalism.”
Read the very first Watergate story here.
Listen to a recording of the conference session referenced in this story: The legacy of Watergate: A conversation with Leonard Downie Jr. (2012).
This recording has been made publicly available from the IRE Resource Center, which is home to thousands of journalism tipsheets, stories, audio recordings and other resources to help enhance your reporting. The Resource Center is available for free to IRE members, and it's just one of our many member benefits!
Learn more and join IRE today.
(March 31, 2025) – Investigative Reporters and Editors is offering a new membership perk this spring. Join or renew your membership by April 28 to receive a 50% discounted subscription to DeleteMe services – a savings of $65!
DeleteMe works to remove personal data online, which can protect journalists against digital security threats such as doxing, targeted personal harassment, phishing and fraud. More than 70 media brands, including ProPublica, Yahoo! and Pinterest, use the service for their employees, but we know all journalists don’t have access to digital safety services – even as they face doxing threats for their essential work.
“In today’s environment, digital safety is a priority for journalists,” said IRE Executive Director Diana R. Fuentes. “IRE is pleased to partner with DeleteMe to offer their vital services to our members at a special rate.”
The consumer-level service is usually $130 a year, but IRE members can sign up now for $65. This discount is valid only through IRE’s spring membership drive, March 31 - April 28, 2025.
Click here to join IRE. Click here to renew your membership. To request the discount code, members who join or renew should email membership@ire.org.
DeleteMe is the latest addition to IRE’s long list of member benefits. Other free and discounted tools for members include Tableau Desktop and Tableau Prep Builder, SmartProcure/GovSpend, PacerMonitor, FOIAEngine, NICAR-Learn, and The IRE Journal.
Members also receive free access to the world’s most extensive library of tipsheets on investigative and data journalism, as well as training webinars and virtual events throughout the year.
About IRE: Investigative Reporters and Editors is a grassroots nonprofit organization dedicated to improving the quality of investigative reporting. IRE provides training, resources and a community of support to thousands of journalists around the world. Learn more about the organization and the benefits of membership.
(March 24, 2025) – The Board of Directors will discuss a change to Article 10 of the organization’s Code of Bylaws at its April 18, 2025, meeting.
The Governance Committee will meet on April 4, 2025, and will be reviewing the proposed update to the bylaws, and will advise the Board.
Proposed Amendment:
“The Endowment Funds are monitored by a Finance Committee that is chaired by the Treasurer and includes six other members of IRE, including one Director. That Director and two of the other members are nominated by the President; the others are nominated by the Treasurer. All are nominated after the annual officer elections and must be approved by the IRE Board. One of the six nominees may be a financial professional who is not an IRE Member. The others must be IRE Members. They serve for two-year terms. The Finance Committee works on fundraising, oversees ongoing revenues and expenses, monitors the Endowment Funds and advises the Board on investment practices.”
If you have comments or questions about this proposed amendment, contact IRE’s Treasurer Mark Greenblatt (mark.greenblatt@asu.edu ) or the chair of IRE’s governance committee Sarah Cohen (sarah.h.cohen@gmail.com).
(March 18, 2025) — NICAR25 brought together more than 900 journalists, educators and students in Minneapolis!
With three-and-a-half days of programming on investigative and data journalism techniques, mapping, programming, AI and so much more, the conference is always packed to the max with practical knowledge and inspiring words of wisdom. Not to mention everything you learn outside of formal classes, by meeting and mingling with fellow colleagues and mentors.
Here are 25 things we learned at NICAR25.
1. “Your data story is not about data. It’s about people.” — Carrie Cochran, Jodie Fleischer (Cox Media Group), and Tom Scheck (APM Reports).
2. Data journalism on college campuses is looking strong! We had students from CUNY, Indiana University, Mizzou, UC Berkeley, University of Minnesota, Syracuse University, University of Texas at Austin — just to name a few. Some students, like Yasmin Garcia and Johan Villatoro, even taught alongside their professors.
3. So many tools are free! RECAP has free documents from PACER archive, and you can set up alerts on court cases you’re watching. Notebook LM will summarize your documents after uploading. Google Pinpoint can help with bulk document search, summarization, and extraction. Check out more time-saving tools here, thanks to Pooja Dantewadia (Realtor.com), Tyler Dukes (McClatchy Media) and Cynthia Tu (Sahan Journal).
4. “I learned how to scrape data into Google Sheets!!” — Claire Rafford, Mirror Indy
5. ”I know how to make a pivot table now” — Dené K. Dryden, The Rochester Post Bulletin
6. “I learned about tugboatinformation.com - a truly wonderful meticulous listing of every tugboat. There's a tugboat in the news in Half Moon Bay, where I live — and I found a page about it on the site! The internet is still a wonderful place.” — Simon Willison, simonwillison.net
7. Singer Bonnie Raitt loves investigative journalism! ESPN reporter Tisha Thompson gave a surprise Lightning Talk about a reporting journey that ended up with her on stage at a Bonnie Rait concert. She spoke about the power of watchdog reporting and the challenges investigative journalists face today. Raitt made a $23K donation to Investigative Reporters and Editors afterwards.
8. The last time IRE went to Minneapolis was more than 30 years ago. The IRE Conference of 1988 was held in the Twin Cities.
9. “Approach AI with cautious curiosity” — Mike Reilley. Check out his free newsletter Journalist’s Toolbox™ for AI tools, resources and training videos for journalists.
10. The 1996 film Fargo is based in Minneapolis. Irene Casado Sanchez, of Big Local News, was the designer of this year’s NICAR T-shirt! Check out her t-shirt, inspired by the film poster!
11. There are so many government datasets that can be downloaded for free as Excel or CSV files and localized to any city, county or state in the United States. Here are 50, shared by David Cuillier and Sydney Sims of the Brechner FOI Project. These datasets can help with research, story ideas, finding trends and much more.
12. NICAR stands for the National Institute of Computer-Assisted Reporting, but it’s gone through a few different name changes. At one point, it was just “CAR,” later becoming “MICAR” for its home-base at Mizzou. It officially became NICAR in 1994.
13. “I learned that there are numerous valid uses for artificial intelligence and machine learning in the newsroom. However, auditing and validating these models and their outputs is essential before publishing or further reporting. Additionally, NICAR25’s various sessions helped me realize the importance of understanding development environments before installing project-specific libraries (hopefully you can avoid cluttering your global environment like I did).” — Diego Torrealba, University of Texas at Austin
14. The difference between a hot dish and a casserole, thanks to Taylor Miller Thomas.
15. The NICAR crowd loves games! We had two nights of NIghtCAR, where attendees played board games and put together puzzles after sessions. We also hosted karaoke and a data-themed scavenger hunt!
16. “Minnesota nice” is a thing. Our local IRE friends brought coats and other warm weather gear for people from out of town.
17. There are pros and cons to different languages. Carla Astudillo (Texas Tribune), Tazbia Fatima (Hearst), Nael Shiab (CBC News) and Kai Teoh (The Dallas Morning News) shared their preferences on what to use for breaking news, scraping data, building a database, and training an AI model.
18. Satellite images can help you with your investigation, and they’re not just for weather events! Sentinel 2 images from every 5 days are free and easy to download from Copernicus Browser.
19. “Learning about BillTrack50 at #NICAR25. It has both free & paid versions, & its features include allowing you to search by keyword & by state, & for similar bills. I’ve already signed up for an account. It also includes federal legislation in search results” — Becky Yerak, WSJ
20. Great investigative projects take time. “Be willing to do tedious work that others aren’t doing — like data entry to analyze 17,000+ trips taken by lawmakers paid for by private entities” — tip from Maggie Mulvihill, shared by Michael Beckel
21. Need data viz on deadline? The open source RAWGraphs web app can help with making charts and graphs, and you don’t need to sign up! Check out more time-saving tools flagged by Rowan Philp at the Global Investigative Journalism Network (GIJN).
22. IRE member Sharon Machlis has compiled tipsheets and slides from NICAR conferences since 2020!
23. You’re always welcome here! “I hadn't been to a NICAR since 2018, somehow, but felt like I've never left. Best event for both practical skill-building and mission inspiration, even/especially in our current industry headwinds. And it was great to make some new friends (in the conference hallways and at the combination drag/soccer bar) and reconnect with many old ones.” — Tyler Machado, independent journalist
24. “A really lovely common thread I’m hearing at multiple #NICAR25 panels: Speakers talking about the time before they were good at what they did. We all started somewhere.” — Emily Hopkins, Mirror Indy
25. If you’re crowdsourcing for information, make sure the link to your survey is public (as we at IRE learned while putting together this blog post…). For actual tips on crowdsourcing data, see this tipsheet from Asia Fields (ProPublica), Jeremy Merrill (The Washington Post) and Leon Yin (Bloomberg News).
The NICAR Conference is IRE’s annual data journalism conference. IRE members can access tipsheets and select session recordings from the conference online. Join us next year - March 5-8, 2026 - in Indianapolis!
(March 5, 2025) — Manny García, Editor in Chief at Houston Landing, and Shawn McIntosh, Head of Standards and Practices at The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, have been nominated for the prestigious IRE Ring of Honor.
The Ring of Honor is a fundraising initiative that supports fellowships for investigative journalists and celebrates legendary current and past members of Investigative Reporters and Editors.
Both past presidents of the IRE Board of Directors, García and McIntosh are renowned standard bearers for investigative and data journalism and beloved mentors in the IRE community.
Born in Cuba and raised in Miami, García is a two-time Pulitzer Prize winner who has held leadership positions at major institutions including the Miami Herald, Nuevo Heraldo, USA Today Network and the Pro Publica-Texas Tribune Investigative Unit, among others.
McIntosh, a pioneer in computer-assisted reporting and founder of NICAR, has been at The Atlanta Journal-Constitution for more than 22 years. She also serves on the board of the Georgia First Amendment Foundation.
García and McIntosh join the late John Bones as the three nominees for the IRE Ring of Honor. Bones, known as the father of data journalism in Norway, was an IRE stalwart before his untimely death last year.
“It is fitting that in the year we are celebrating our 50th anniversary, IRE is looking at paying tribute to three of our most important firsts: John Bones, the first international IRE member nominated for the Ring of Honor; Shawn McIntosh, our first female nominee; and Manny García, the first person of color elected president of IRE,” said IRE Executive Director Diana R. Fuentes.
“Manny and Shawn continue to be active members of IRE and are admired mentors for the next generation of journalists,” Fuentes said. “We are privileged to count them among our ranks. John was taken from us too soon. He is sorely missed.”
The Ring of Honor, an initiative started in 2022, is open to current and past members of IRE. After a member is nominated for the Ring of Honor, the IRE Board of Directors reviews the nomination. If the nomination is approved, friends and family conduct a campaign to raise funds to honor the nominee. A minimum of $2,500 in donations is required to induct the nominee into the Ring of Honor.
The funds provide fellowships and help journalists and students gain access to IRE’s top-of-the-line training, resources and networking opportunities.
Bones, who was nominated in October, will be inducted into the Ring of Honor at the 2025 IRE Conference in New Orleans. You can learn more about his campaign here.
Bones was general manager of SKUP, the Norwegian counterpart of IRE, when he died of cancer May 13, 2024. He was 69. He had previously been in leadership roles at VG, the most-read daily in Norway. Bones regularly brought groups of international journalists to NICAR and the IRE Conference.
The nominations for García and McIntosh were approved at the Feb. 7 board meeting.
García served on the IRE Board of Directors from 2006 to 2014; he was elected president in 2011, serving one term. McIntosh served on the board from 1994 to 2006 and was first elected president in 2002, serving two terms.
Learn more and donate to García’s campaign here. Learn more and donate to McIntosh’s campaign here.
“All three have contributed significantly not only to our organization, but to our industry as a whole,” Fuentes said. “They helped shape investigative and data journalism as we know it today.”
The organizers of the campaigns for García and McIntosh hope to complete fundraising by June so they can be inducted at the IRE Conference in June.
Donations are tax deductible and help IRE recognize the legacy of these influential newsroom leaders while financially supporting the new wave of investigative journalists. For more information about the Ring of Honor, send an email to Anna López, IRE’s director of partnerships, at anna@ire.org.
(Feb. 24, 2025) — Today, the IRE Board of Directors issued the following statement:
For 50 years, Investigative Reporters and Editors (IRE) has worked to foster excellence in investigative journalism by providing cutting-edge training, promoting high standards and supporting a community of truthtellers.
Investigative journalism plays an essential role in society. It provides a check on power, exposing wrongdoing, saving taxpayer money and protecting the vulnerable from abuse. The ability of the media to do this work freely is not just a professional concern — it is a fundamental pillar of an informed world.
The United States government has recently taken several actions against journalists that raise serious concerns, including launching targeted investigations, blocking access to public events and threatening to cut funding that supports some investigative news organizations here and abroad.
IRE stands strongly with our colleagues around the globe. The organization is forming a working group to explore how it can help protect an independent press and access to public data.
Our training evolves as our members’ needs change. We have a variety of training resources available, including webinars and tipsheets. We are planning events on digital security and protecting your team amid other safety threats. We are also working with other journalism organizations on efforts to preserve public information, including essential data.
If you have suggestions, training requests or other ideas, please contact us at president@ire.org.
(Feb. 21, 2025) – On Feb. 22, 1975, a group of intrepid journalists got together to discuss the emerging world of investigative reporting. Up until then, the few investigative journalists were mostly “lone wolves” in their newsrooms, working on their own and often in fierce competition.
The soon-to-be founders of IRE wondered: What if we help each other instead?
That visionary thought 50 years ago has blossomed into a powerful, supportive community of nearly 5,000 journalists from around the world, today the largest journalist organization based in the United States.
“There is no better time to celebrate investigative journalism than now,” said Executive Director Diana R. Fuentes. “In the face of attacks from many quarters, we are called upon to rally together and keep speaking truth to power and fighting for the people’s right to know. The work our members do every day is truly inspiring. Long live IRE!”
Fifty years of IRE. This milestone is special.
It means that for half a century – through decades of shifting politics and policies, advancements in tools and technology, racial reckonings, financial hardships, industry turmoil, busy news cycles and so much more – our members have stayed true to the belief that journalism can help us all live in a better, more informed world.
Year after year, thousands of journalists have packed into conferences and workshops to share their secrets, to commiserate and to gain inspiration and motivation.
“We are so proud of the storied history of IRE, but we also know that the work continues,” said Brian M. Rosenthal, an investigative reporter at The New York Times and president of the IRE Board of Directors. “This is a moment to celebrate, and to commit ourselves to continuing to carry the torch for the next 50 years, and beyond.”
To celebrate this historic milestone, we have exciting plans throughout 2025. See details below and join us!
On March 25, listen to IRE’s real OGs talk about our beginnings and their views of today and tomorrow. We are honored to welcome Len Downie Jr. and Ed DeLaney for this extraordinary online event. They both attended the original meeting of IRE in 1975, and they are still active in our community.
In conversation with Deb Nelson, a veteran IRE member herself and past president who won her first IRE Award in 1984, Downie and DeLaney will talk about the obstacles the group overcame to get IRE started, remembering the strife and the laughter, too; whether they thought we’d ever be where we are today; and where they see us going in the future.
Downie was at The Washington Post at the time, fresh from editing the Watergate stories that led to the resignation of President Nixon, and DeLaney was a lawyer who shepherded the creation of the new nonprofit IRE. Today, Downie is a professor at Arizona State University’s Walter Cronkite School of Journalism, and DeLaney is a Democratic legislator in the Indiana State House of Representatives.
This special event is free to all IRE members. Please register here.
The IRE Conference, set for June 19-22 in New Orleans, is our biggest event of the year, and it’s going to be extra special this year because of the anniversary. We’re thrilled to announce legendary journalist Jim Steele as the 2025 keynote speaker.
Steele was among the first members of IRE and has stayed active in the organization, serving as a mentor for countless young journalists and participating in dozens of conference sessions, among other roles.
“From my first IRE convention in Indianapolis in 1976 to countless other ones along the way across our land, I have believed in the work we all do and in the vital role IRE has played in advancing it,” Steele said in accepting the invitation. “It is a mission that continues and indeed is more crucial than ever.”
Steele will address conferees at the Awards Luncheon on Saturday, June 21.
A former contributing editor at Vanity Fair and editor at large at Time magazine, Steele and his longtime reporting partner, the late Don Barlett, won two Pulitzer prizes and dozens of other awards for their comprehensive data analysis and investigations into wide-ranging public issues including the Internal Revenue Service, federal housing programs, criminal justice, income inequality and nuclear waste, to name just a few. In 1972, the team worked with Philip Meyer, the pioneer in computer-assisted journalism, in using an early computer to analyze more than 1,000 Philadelphia crime cases. It was the largest CAR project of its time.
The reporting duo also wrote nine books, two of which became New York Times bestsellers.
Steele teaches at Temple University and serves on the Board of Directors of the Fund for Investigative Journalism.
Now for something completely different at IRE25. To celebrate the anniversary, we are offering a smashing totally New Orleans-style event: A rocking dinner on a riverboat, cruising the mighty Mississippi!
This is a one-of-a-kind separate affair with tickets available only to those attending the conference and their families (and friends). It will take place the evening of Friday, June 20 — after the day’s conference sessions end — and tickets are $95 each. All proceeds will go to our 50th anniversary fund to support our efforts to expand training in the future.
The two-hour cruise will include live music, appetizers, dinner, dessert and an open bar. You won’t want to miss it!
Once you've registered for the conference, you can purchase tickets for the cruise here.
This is just some of what we’re doing to celebrate our birthday! Already we’re offering an exceptional membership deal for retired journalists who are no longer working full time: $50 for the 50th! Retirees can join or renew in 2025 and get a one-year membership for just $50 instead of $75.
Our 50th Anniversary Task Force is cooking up more engaging and fun-filled experiences, in person and online. Stay alert for upcoming announcements as we roll them out. If you haven’t already, sign up for the Quick Hits newsletter to be the first to know the latest IRE news and updates.
(Feb. 18, 2025) — Longtime IRE member Tom Koch is an accomplished journalist and author, an expert in mapping, data analysis, elder care, medical ethics and so much more.
But in the 1980s, an unsafe work environment threatened to derail that promising career.
“They wanted to put me on permanent disability leave because I couldn't use their computers,” Koch said. “But the problem wasn’t me, it was the computers.”
He successfully fought back, winning concessions that set the first standard for ergonomics within newsrooms in North America.
Read about Koch’s inspiring life, how he went on to cover the U.S. Olympics, wrote more than a dozen books, and how today he’s still publishing and helping fellow journalists cover public health and disability issues in a profile featured at the new digital home for The IRE Journal.
His story is just one of the features in the new version of The Journal, the official publication of Investigative Reporters and Editors, the largest professional journalist organization in the nation. The online publication includes the same in-depth stories and regular departments previously available in the print version, plus new audio and interactive features — including the latest IRE Radio Podcast episodes, recent newsletters and comprehensive content relevant to journalists today.
IRE announced the new digital format in late 2024, designed to expand accessibility and provide members with a more dynamic, interactive experience.
Members can access the online magazine after logging in at ire.org with their regular login and password. The Journal is under the Resources tab on the homepage.
Check back for new stories published regularly. Here are a few in the works:
We want your feedback: If you have an idea for a story, send us a pitch! We welcome any critical and constructive feedback as we strive to improve The IRE Journal. Submit your pitch or general feedback via this Google form, or send us a note by email at editorial@ire.org.
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