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Aliyya Swaby

I write about children, families and inequality in the South.

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What I Cover

I report on issues affecting children and families including education, criminal justice, healthcare and the social safety net.

My Background

I joined ProPublica’s South unit in 2021, after spending several years covering public education and state politics at The Texas Tribune. My reporting in Texas exposed school officials criminalizing students for vaping, highlighted the state’s role in remote learning failures and drew attention to mental health challenges among young children. My series on the legacy of school segregation in Texas was a Livingston Award finalist. I also won a prize in the 2020 National Awards for Education Reporting for beat reporting that investigated the impact of the coronavirus on Texas public schools.

My reporting at ProPublica, in collaboration with WPLN News, about Tennessee youth being wrongly arrested and expelled for alleged threats of mass violence won a prize in the 2024 National Awards for Education Reporting. In the aftermath of the project, the legislature passed a fix to the school threats law.