Drew Saunders
Business and climate journalist seeking full time employment or a journalism fellowship. Won the 2024 environmental journalism award (class C) from the Detroit chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists.
drewsaunders.com
Contact information:
ats2173@columbia.edu / drewsaunders93@gmail.com
Education
Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism – Master of Science in journalism – 2018 to 2019
I focused on international and investigative reporting at the J School. While there I was immersed in environmental journalism, data journalism, international reporting, investigative techniques, and working in teams. My master’s project focused on climate and jobs.
Eastern Michigan University – Bachelor of Science journalism – 2009 to 2016
I fell in love with reporting as a student. There were weeks when I wrote the entire news section of my student paper! My first journalism experience was when I started there in 2012. By the end of my tenure in 2016, it was not unusual for my work to be the entire news section. I also was the news intern at EMU’s local affiliate for NPR, 89.1 WEMU, while I was a student.
(Mostly Freelancing) Experience
Freelance journalist, Sustainable Views. January 2026 to present – My first official foray into financial journalism is a piece in SV that answers a simple question. How successful is the second Trump Administration actually being in actually stopping wind projects from going ahead, and what does the future of the industry look like from an investors point of view? It was so cool for my first piece of financial journalism to also be just as much a piece of environmental journalism.
Freelance journalist, Concentrate. January 2025 to present – Concentrate is a solutions journalism site covering Washtenaw County. I have covered the cost of living crisis, health insurance affordability, and business profiles for them.
Freelance journalist, Pulp. October 2024 to present – The Ann Arbor Public Library has its own online A&E publication. While freelancing for it, I have covered an environmentalist approach to music and community, how Latino heritage has shaped the University of Michigan over decades, how imagery is used to shape political narratives, and how music can be used to help in psychological science.
Freelance journalist, Inside climate news – January 2024 – I have only done one story so far for ICN, about mass timber, but I am including this because the story is a great example of the journalism that I am passionate about. It is about how the climate change can be judo flipped into becoming an equitable economic gold mine.
Freelance journalist, Between The Lines – July 2023 to present – I contribute to Michigan’s oldest LGBT publication. I recently took over the Where Are They Now column.
Freelance journalist, Adm street publishing – January 2023 to present – Adam Street Publishing owns both Current Magazine, Ann Arbor Family, and the Toledo City Paper. While my byline mostly appears in Current, I have covered music previews, restaurant reviews, and the lack of affordability of living in Ann Arbor, Michigan, as well as environmental issues affecting quality of life. I have also covered the ongoing evolution of the viability of businesses going green.
Freelance journalist, Hour Detroit – October 2022 to present – It was while freelancing for Detroit’s monthly features magazine that I received my first ever professional journalism award. It is an environmental journalism award, Class C, from the Detroit chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists, for a story called Detroit Underwater. It delves into how the increasingly destructive storms made worse by man-made climate change are wreaking havoc on Metro Detroit’s creaking water and sewage infrastructure, with drastically different results for a Detroit neighborhood and its adjacent, affluent suburb.
Reporter, The Monroe News – April 2022 to August 2022 – I was initially hired into the Monroe News newsroom as a court reporter, but I also covered general assignment topics. Monroe is a city about halfway between Detroit and Toledo. My most substantial piece was an environmental story involving a fuel spill and a recall election petition. My time at the paper ended because of budgetary reasons, causing the company to lay off a large percentage of the employees across the company. I was the first in and then the first out.
Reporter, The Sun Times-News – November 2020 to April 2022 – I was a beat reporter for a weekly newspaper covering the rural towns west of Ann Arbor, Michigan. I covered city hall, the business community, and the school board during the height of the pandemic and the beginnings of the culture wars. I still occasionally freelance for them.
Freelance journalist, The Oakland County Times– May 2017 to November 2020 – The Oakland County Times is an online-only news source covering the suburbs northwest of Detroit. I freelanced for them until just after graduate school.
Freelance journalist, We Love Dexter – July 2015 to December 2016 – We Love Dexter was originally started by one of the former reporters for a weekly newspaper in the area that had just folded. I worked for him on a freelance basis until a dispute over how to handle pushback to coverage from a subject who was embarrassed by the result of a planning permission dispute. I resigned in protest.
Freelance journalist, The Ypsilanti Courier/the Saline Reporter/the Chelsea Standard – January to October 2014 – Ann Arbor used to be ringed by a whole collection of weekly newspapers. I was one of the last freelancers for them before they folded.
Freelance journalist, The Ann Arbor Observer – October 2013 to present – My first ever freelancing gig was a little piece covering typewriters for Ann Arbor’s monthly features magazine. I have recently restarted my freelancing relationship with the newsprint magazine.
References
1. Kathryn Walsh, Editor of Hour Detroit. kwalsh@hour-media.com Phone: 248.691.1800
2. Mary Schoonmaker. Adjunct journalism professor at Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism and former associate editor at the Columbia Journalism Review. She was my master’s project advisor at the J School. Mes2261@columbia.edu. Cell: 201.233.4545
3. Howard French. Professor of at Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism. Hf2205@columbia.edu. Phone: 212.854.0163