Missouri School of Journalism’s Watchdog Writers Group announces new fellows and student reporters
L-R: The WWG 2023-2024 class — Alisa Roth, Sarah Smarsh, Mya Frazier, Sophia Anderson, Anna Colleto, Caleb Gayle, Christopher Leonard
Authors and students will produce books and articles on immigration, the meatpacking industry, racial segregation in Oklahoma and the ravages of shareholder capitalism on small-town America.
The Missouri School of Journalism has selected its fifth class of authors to receive the Watchdog Writers Group fellowship, a $50,000 annual stipend that will allow the journalists to write a book and help mentor a student reporter at the university.
The new fellows are Alec MacGillis, a ProPublica reporter and author of “Fulfillment: Winning and Losing in One-Click America”; Molly O’Toole, a Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter who covered immigration for The Los Angeles Times; and Ted Genoways, an award-winning reporter who has written multiple books on agriculture including “This Blessed Life: A Year in the Life of an American Family Farm.”
They are joined by returning fellows Caleb Gayle, who is completing his biography of pioneering Black politician Edward McCabe; and Mya Frazier, who is writing a book about the U.S. credit scoring system. Frazier is also stepping into a new role as the WWG’s first program director for student development.
“WWG is supporting the kind of deep-dive reporting that enriches the public debate about some of today’s most important issues,” said Christopher Leonard, director of the WWG. “It’s a privilege to not only support this vitally important journalism, but to prepare the next generation to follow in the footsteps of today’s best reporters.”
The Watchdog Writers Group fellows partner with Missouri School of Journalism students who help them report on the topics of their book while also producing investigative journalism that will be published in partner media outlets.
Established in 2019, the Watchdog Writers Group has a dual mission: to financially support authors as they write a deeply reported nonfiction book in the public interest while simultaneously training the next generation of young reporters. The program was launched with a $1.1 million grant from the 11th Hour Project, the grant-making arm of The Schmidt Family Foundation, which continues to support the program. The WWG also receives generous support from the William T. Kemper Foundation, the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation and the Banjo Fund, all based in Missouri.
Meet the fellows and their students
Alec MacGillis will be working on his latest project, an investigative memoir about the industrial legacy of General Electric in his hometown of Pittsfield, Mass., where his father was editor of the local newspaper and where GE once employed more than 13,000 people. The book will examine what it means for a small city to face the loss of broadly shared prosperity and social capital that sustained it for most of its existence. MacGillis will work with MU senior Egan Ward, who will investigate GE’s legacy in Pittsfield.
Molly O’Toole will work on her first book, called “The Route,” which investigates the billion-dollar business that brings the world’s refugees to the U.S. border. The book will reveal the globe-spanning smuggling industry behind this unprecedented migration, exposing a billion-dollar, black market business in human beings that is fueled by U.S. policy and worldwide hunger for a share of the American dream. O’Toole will work with senior Emma Flannery, who will examine the life of refugees scattered throughout the American heartland.
Ted Genoways will work on his new book, “The Kill Floor: Big Meat and the Future of America,” that will track the demographic shifts in several meatpacking towns and chart the concurrent rise in white nationalism in those communities. It will examine how U.S. immigration raids led the meatpacking industry to shift away from undocumented labor toward recruiting and hiring refugees. Genoways will work with graduate student Bryan Chou, who will report on the legal fallout from years of immigration raids.
Returning fellow Caleb Gayle, a contributing writer at the New York Times Magazine and a professor at Northeastern University, will complete his book “Black Moses: A Saga of Ambition and the Fight for the Black State,” which explores the fraught history of Edward McCabe’s effort to turn Oklahoma into a Black state during the period following Reconstruction as an alternative to the more repressive South. The story will span from the 1800s to a modern-day accounting of McCabe’s legacy. Gayle will work with senior Anna Colletto, who will report on the legacy of Black-only towns founded by McCabe and his supporters.
Mya Frazier is writing “Scored,” a book about three American families living under the stigma of bad credit. Frazier will work with senior Paige Gerling, who will research how the “Big Three” credit bureaus and other powerful companies profit from this punitive credit scoring system.
Frazier will also begin her role as the WWG’s program director for student development. She will oversee student mentorship and training efforts at the WWG, enriching student access to the best techniques and practices of investigative reporting. During her years at the WWG, Frazier has become an integral part of the program’s efforts to grow and develop new programming for student enrichment.
More details about the WWG can be found at watchdogwritersgroup.com.
Updated: September 4, 2024