Education

Princeton University, Princeton, NJ

Graduation: June 2014

 

• A.B. degree, Major: Politics, Certificate: American Studies. Magna cum laude

• Thesis: "Just Words? An experimental analysis of presidential rhetoric's impact on African-American opinion" (125 pages). Won the Lyman H. Atwater Prize as the most outstanding political science thesis. Click here to view independent work.

• Co-chair, Class Day 2014 Committee

 

University of Oxford, Hertford College, Oxford, England

January 2013 - June 2013

 

• Studied British and European politics during semester abroad.

• Played on Varsity American Football team.

• Backpacked across Europe for six weeks independently.

  

Phillips Exeter Academy, Exeter, NH

Graduation: June 2010

Experience

The Houston Chronicle, Houston, TX

Political Reporter (August 2014 - Present)

 

• Cover local elections, political demographics and the power players that officially and unofficially govern the nation’s fourth largest city.

• Lead coverage of Houston’s wide-open mayoral race, analyzing the latest shifts in political strategy, staff hires and the state of the field each week for print while aggressively covering the race on Twitter.

• Report on the 2016 presidential election in a town considered the “Republican ATM” and in a state with four likely presidential candidates.

• Wrote step-back, analytical pieces about the midterm elections in Texas, detailing Wendy Davis’ inability to win over suburban women, an advertising war between trial lawyers and insurers and how the White House’s executive action on immigration shaped a local special election.

• Recruited through Hearst Newspapers’ Journalism Fellowship, given yearly to five young journalists. 

 

The New York Times, Washington, DC

David E. Rosenbaum Reporting Fellow (June 2014 - August 2014)

 

• Wrote 20 stories and contributed to seven others as the sole intern in the paper’s Washington bureau.

• Led the paper’s coverage from Mississippi of the state’s runoff Senate election during the campaign’s final week.

• Traveled the length of West Virginia to paint a portrait of how changing state demographics shaped midterm elections.

• Covered the corruption trial of former Virginia governor Bob McDonnell from the federal courthouse in Richmond.

• Spent two weeks in Congress helping to cover congressional attempts to solve child migrant crisis.

 

The Philadelphia Inquirer, Philadelphia, PA

City Desk Intern (June 2013 - August 2013)

 

• Wrote 34 stories, eight of which landed on the front-page.

• Detailed increase in violence against cabbies, the shooting of a police officer, the saga of a woman mistakenly thought to be buried, the life of an obsessive Wikipedian and the rise of the intercity bus industry.

• Covered Philadelphia building collapses and broke several stories on subsequent litigation filed.

 

The Daily Princetonian, Princeton, NJ

News Editor (January 2012 - January 2013)

Staff Writer (September 2010 - January 2012)

 

• Broke the story that CIA Director David Petraeus was interested in serving as Princeton University president, which received extensive attention in outlets ranging from AFP to The New York Times, and wrote a profile of Indiana governor Mitch Daniels detailing his drug arrest while he was an undergraduate.

• Spent 50 hours a week managing a staff of 30 writers to produce a daily student-run newspaper.

• Focused on increasing the commitment of staffers by overhauling the writer experience; created beat and mentorship systems and expanded opportunities for editor-writer interaction and feedback.

• Conceptualized, assigned and edited 25 to 30 news stories a week, with a special focus on long-term investigative pieces, feature stories and in-depth analysis articles.