Education’s one of those beats that can feel endlessly big, but I love it for its bigness: preschools, and middle schools, and high schools, and colleges, technical colleges, historically Black colleges, and public schools, private schools, charter schools, magnet schools and everything else that this laundry list of institutions touch in our city and state. So I guess it’s easiest to say that I cover learning–all kinds, and for all people. I’m one of those folks who thinks learning is the engine of life, so doing this job is a privilege and pleasure.
I wasn’t a journalism kid in college. But I knew that I liked to read, write, talk and work with sound (my major was “American Studies” and I devoted most of those credits to classes on Black literature). A friend put me on to NPR’s Kroc Fellowship and it seemed perfect for someone like me. So I applied, and was lucky enough to get it. The Kroc Fellowship is a rotational program, so I started on the Washington Desk, then transitioned to the National Desk, then spent some time at WDET (the NPR member station in Detroit), then ended with a stint on “Weekend Edition.” I applied for this job while I was at WDET and heard I got the gig my last day at the station. After a frenzied month of packing my life in DC, driving cross-country and moving my little sister into college, I started at WABE in August of 2023.
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Email jsei@wabe.org
Phone 503-998-5136
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