Investigative Reporter Mike McIntire Shows Neirad the Ropes
NEIRAD enilno edition
Darien High School always seems to attract the best of the best, whether it’s our fine educators, top sports teams or famed journalists who kindly take time to visit our journalism classes.
The tradition lived on when “The New York Times” investigative reporter Mike McIntire stopped by DHS to share tips and stories with the Neirad team last month.
“It was really an honor to have him here.” sophomore Neirad reporter Lisa Randall said.
The New York Times has a news staff of 1,200 people. Within that body of journalists, Mr. McIntire was selected six years ago to be on an elite group of about a dozen journalists who comprise the Times investigative team. He is also an adjunct professorat New York University.
Prior to the Times, Mr McIntire was a 2001 Pulitzer Prize finalist for investigative reporting on medical malpractice when he worked at The Hartford Courant. He has a bachelor’s degree from Hartwick College in Oneonta, New York.
Mr.McIntire shared tips with the budding reporters how they could begin to hunt down public information and use it to develop investigative stories for Neirad.
For example, he used his skills to show the students how to dig up the average Darien School District teacher salary of $66,000 and the average principal salary in the mid $100,000 range.
“The Internet has made all this much easier,” Mr McIntire said referring to how he accesses some of the data used in his stories.
Mr. McIntire said in a single hour he was able to find several fresh story ideas hidden in databases. For example, he explained how he found data on a state of Connecticut Web site that showed three convicted sex offenders reside in town. He also used court records to determine 21 Darien residents have filed for bankruptcy over the past year. Another example included proof a toxic waste site in town apparently has not been tested for 14 years.
Mr. McIntire told the audience that reporters must realize there is a sense of duty that goes with having the ability to access such data. “Knowing information bears the responsibility of how someone will use it,” he said.
Young journalists often find the hardest part of getting a story to print is to flush out the information and write clear concise copy. However, this is no longer a hard feat to accomplish for Mr. McIntire. Some recent examples include an article on The Top 5 Worst Doctors in our nation that he broke by studying copious amounts of data and learning to decode the medical terminology that eventually helped him figure out the identities of the unnamed doctors. His most recent high profile accomplishment was covering President Barack Obama’s campaign for the past two years.
Mr. McIntire’s visit was a treat that inspired the students to see how hard work, strong writing skills and talent may land them the opportunity to work in prime journalism real estate one day.
