Aliyya Swaby is a reporter in ProPublica’s South unit covering children, families and social inequality. Previously, she was a reporter at the Texas Tribune, where she covered public education and state politics starting in 2016. Her 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. Her series on the legacy of school segregation in Texas was a Livingston Award finalist. Swaby also won first place in the 2020 National Awards for Education Reporting for beat reporting that investigated the impact of the coronavirus on Texas public schools.
Before joining the Tribune, Swaby was a local reporter at the New Haven Independent covering public education, transit and zoning, and an independent reporter in Panama covering social issues in Black communities.
A 2023 state law requires a yearlong expulsion for any student who threatens mass violence on school property. But some students have been kicked out even when school officials determined that the threat was not credible.
The states violated federal law by banning coverage of certain treatments for transgender people but allowing it for others, according to a decision that could influence courts around the country.
ProPublica is building a network of educators, students, parents and other experts to help guide our reporting about education. Take a few minutes to join our source network and share what you know.
The state’s small electricity providers aren’t required to delay disconnecting seriously ill customers who depend on medical devices, putting lives at risk.
The Medical University of South Carolina initially said it wouldn’t be affected by a law banning use of state funds for treatment “furthering the gender transition” of children under 16. Months later, it cut off that care to all trans minors.
A North Carolina policy that denies state employees coverage for gender-affirming care has been on hold pending appeal. For one transgender worker still awaiting surgery, the anxiety is “like somebody has got their hands around my neck.”
Lawsuits brought by transgender employees show how state agencies fight against paying for gender-affirming care for some people while others are covered.
Gender-affirming care is medically necessary but can be hard to access. ProPublica is investigating the ways transgender people are blocked from getting quality health care related to gender transitions.
Officials in Houston County, Georgia, said gender-affirming surgery for sheriff’s deputy Anna Lange was too costly. They spent more than $1 million on private lawyers in a fight to keep transition-related care from being covered by their health plan.
Experts say that more money is critical to improving the national system. Many states have developed creative solutions in spite of their limited funding.
The nation’s approach to adult education has so far neglected to connect the millions of people struggling to read with the programs set up to help them.
Olivia Coley-Pearson offered help to voters who struggle to read. For taking on one of America’s oldest forms of voter suppression, she got threats, a trip to jail and a reminder of the nation’s long legacy of weaponizing literacy.
Across the country, from California to Georgia, people like Olivia Coley-Pearson and Faye Combs are working through stigma and increased restrictions as they help people who struggle to read exercise their right to vote.
As a new wave of restrictions makes voting harder for people who struggle to read — now 1 in 5 Americans — Olivia Coley-Pearson has taken up the fight, even if it makes her a target.
For decades, researchers have studied the factors that influence voter participation, including the impact of educational attainment on whether people vote. But literacy skills are less commonly examined. So we sought to understand the connection.
Voting can be a convoluted obstacle course, especially for those who can’t read. Here are proven ways of fixing the system and enabling millions more voters to participate.
Clayton County has the highest percentage of Black residents in Georgia and the lowest vaccination rate in the metro Atlanta area. Amid widespread community mistrust, a strained health department struggles to figure out what to do next.
As the Delta variant spreads across the country, ProPublica is reporting on the health and safety of students. Tell ProPublica whether your school is following CDC guidelines and whether any students, faculty or staff have gotten sick.
Thank you for your interest in republishing this story. You are are free to republish it so long as you do the following:
You have to credit ProPublica and any co-reporting partners. In the byline, we prefer “Author Name, Publication(s).” At the top of the text of your story, include a line that reads: “This story was originally published by ProPublica.” You must link the word “ProPublica” to the original URL of the story.
If you’re republishing online, you must link to the URL of this story on propublica.org, include all of the links from our story, including our newsletter sign up language and link, and use our PixelPing tag.
If you use canonical metadata, please use the ProPublica URL. For more information about canonical metadata, refer to this Google SEO link.
You can’t edit our material, except to reflect relative changes in time, location and editorial style. (For example, “yesterday” can be changed to “last week,” and “Portland, Ore.” to “Portland” or “here.”)
You cannot republish our photographs or illustrations without specific permission. Please contact [email protected].
It’s okay to put our stories on pages with ads, but not ads specifically sold against our stories. You can’t state or imply that donations to your organization support ProPublica’s work.
You can’t sell our material separately or syndicate it. This includes publishing or syndicating our work on platforms or apps such as Apple News, Google News, etc.
You can’t republish our material wholesale, or automatically; you need to select stories to be republished individually. (To inquire about syndication or licensing opportunities, contact [email protected].)
You can’t use our work to populate a website designed to improve rankings on search engines or solely to gain revenue from network-based advertisements.
We do not generally permit translation of our stories into another language.
Any website our stories appear on must include a prominent and effective way to contact you.
If you share republished stories on social media, we’d appreciate being tagged in your posts. We have official accounts for ProPublica on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram.
Copy and paste the following into your page to republish:
