Jessica Bakeman
Jessica Bakeman reports on K-12 and higher education for WLRN, south Florida's NPR affiliate. While new to Miami and public radio, Jessica is a seasoned journalist who has covered education policymaking and politics in three state capitals: Jackson, Miss.; Albany, N.Y.; and, most recently, Tallahassee.
Jessica first moved to the Sunshine State in 2015 to help launch POLITICO Florida as part of the company’s national expansion. She is the immediate past president of the Capitol Press Club of Florida, a nonprofit organization that raises money for college scholarships benefiting journalism students.
Jessica was an original member of POLITICO New York’s Albany bureau. Also in the Empire State, Jessica covered politics for The Wall Street Journal and USA Today. As part of Gannett’s three-person Albany bureau, she won the New York Publishers Association award for distinguished state government coverage in 2013 and 2014. Jessica twice chaired a planning committee for the Albany press corps’ annual political satire show, the oldest of its kind in the country.
She started her career at The Clarion-Ledger in Jackson. There she won the Louisiana/Mississippi Associated Press Managing Editors’ 2013 first place award for continuing coverage of former Gov. Haley Barbour’s decision to pardon more than 200 felons as he left office.
She earned her bachelor’s degree in journalism and English literature from SUNY Plattsburgh, a public liberal arts college in northeastern New York. She (proudly) hails from Rochester, N.Y.
-
This story was last updated on Wednesday, Oct. 30 at 11:26 a.m Miami-Dade County Public Schools students performed at the same level or better than... -
New state policies born out of the Parkland school shooting have drawn the scrutiny of two national nonprofit research organizations, which have argued... -
Florida would boast the second-highest starting salaries for teachers in the country under a new plan from Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis. DeSantis wants... -
UPDATED: Education Reform Now has acknowledged its report was inaccurate and has reissued the report with an apology. Read more here . South Florida... -
The Miami-Dade County School Board has filed a federal lawsuit against more than a dozen corporations that manufacture or distribute opioids, claiming... -
After a former student killed 17 people at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School last year, Florida public school children are being watched more closely. -
More and more schools are investing in technologies that scan social media posts, school assignments and even student emails for potential threats. Privacy experts say the trade-offs aren't worth it. -
For people who don't have consistent access to food, the effects of Hurricane Dorian could linger for weeks. Floridians who were scheduled to receive... -
Like most South Floridians, school district officials here were closely watching Hurricane Dorian as it approached the state. In anticipation of the... -
Hundreds of young voters gathered at a bar not far from the debate hall in Miami to take in what the Democratic presidential candidates had to say Thursday night.
