Bridie Short
Bridie Short focuses on stories that show how learning environments shape young people's experiences and engagement with wider issues. Her work centres on education, with attention to the people and events that define daily life in classrooms and other learning settings. She writes about education for Lynn News, a local news publication with a focus on community stories.
Student performance on climate emergency
In her piece on drama students paying homage to the climate emergency with a thrilling performance, Short presents the production as the central event and keeps the focus on the students and their work. The article frames their creative response to the climate emergency as part of their educational experience, blending arts coverage with an education lens.
Education reporting within a community news agenda
Short's education coverage sits within Lynn News's broader community agenda, connecting stories from learning environments to the publication's general news mix. Her pieces are grounded in concrete events and activities, such as performances and projects, giving readers a view of what students and staff are doing rather than abstract policy debate.
4 more education journalists.
Catherine Strohfeldt
Catherine Strohfeldt reports how education policy, money and behaviour collide in Queensland classrooms and childcare services, focusing on what government decisions mean for students, families and teachers day to day. She is an education reporter at Brisbane Times covering schools, universities and early learning alongside related state policy. She often starts with a single school, subject or provider to explain shifts in funding, discipline and workforce conditions, treating suspension statistics, surveys and on-the-ground accounts as complementary evidence. Her work links school fees, capital funding and teacher pay deals to who can access which schools and on what terms. Her beat extends into childcare chains in crisis and university leadership and governance. She also covers Queensland government, planning and environmental issues, showing how housing, health and coastal decisions reshape the communities in her education reporting.
Charles Bliss
Charles Bliss is a features-led reporter at the Eastern Daily Press whose distinct focus is education told through human stories about schools, pupils and the adults who work with them. He writes about what it feels like to be in a classroom or school community, using specific events, characters and concrete activity to show how reading, creativity and wellbeing are encouraged in young people. His education coverage centres children and teachers rather than policy, turning visits, campaigns and workshops into narrative pieces with practical detail. He gives particular weight to wellbeing, mental health and sensory learning, linking health, psychology and horticulture through tangible examples. Alongside education he covers health, environment, behaviour, everyday guidance and local innovation, using plain explanation, step-by-step advice and narrative structure to show how people learn, adapt and look after each other in their communities.
Conor Duffy
Conor Duffy stands out for linking education policy to the daily lives of students, parents and teachers, treating the classroom as part of a wider social system. He is the ABC’s national education and parenting reporter. His beat spans schools, universities and family life. He covers education policy, test scores, rankings, funding, teacher workload, behaviour, school refusal, student wellbeing and parenting stress. He reports on NAPLAN, university rankings, the Job Ready Graduates legislation and the cost of humanities degrees. He also covers privacy and school data. His reporting combines hard data, policy detail and personal stories. He has also done foreign, environment and investigative work for the ABC, including as North America correspondent, and has worked across Lateline, 7.30 and AM.
Darcy Fitzgerald
Darcy Fitzgerald stands out for reporting the school system from inside the classroom outwards. He is a national education reporter within the News Corp Australia network, writing across The Advertiser, Herald Sun, Courier-Mail and Daily Telegraph. A former teacher, he covers schools and education with classroom dynamics in view, and he treats teachers, students and families as the starting point for stories. His beat includes school-related issues and trends across jurisdictions, school structures, academic results, shifts in schooling models, and the practical costs and realities of schooling for families. He has also written on the decline of single-sex schooling, co-education, school holiday care, fees, eligibility rules and subsidy settings. His reporting is grounded in classroom experience and aims at system-wide coverage that still stays tied to specific school communities.