Simon Little
Simon Little is a journalist with CBC News whose reporting concentrates on how public institutions in British Columbia function under pressure, with education, health care and local services at the centre of his beat. His work follows labour disputes, contract talks and service disruptions in real time, showing how decisions made by governments and unions affect classrooms, hospitals and everyday life. He brings more than a decade of experience on the local news beat and has earned regional journalism awards for digital breaking news and excellence in news reporting.
Public-sector labour and education
Labour conflict in the public sector is a recurring thread in Little’s coverage, and he often approaches it through the lens of education.
His reporting has tracked prolonged bargaining between the provincial government and the B.C. teachers’ union, detailing how the teachers’ federation has been at the table since the spring and has gone without a contract since the end of June. In these stories he focuses on what contract gaps mean for classrooms, teacher workloads and the broader stability of the school system, rather than treating bargaining as a purely political process. That labour focus carries over into other public-sector beats, where he uses strikes, picket lines and union actions to show how policy and funding decisions resonate in schools and other frontline settings.
Health care, nurses and emergency services
Little devotes significant attention to health care and emergency response, often connecting those systems back to the communities they serve.
In coverage of striking nurses on Vancouver Island, he concentrates on the reasons nurses move to picket lines, the staffing and workload concerns behind their actions, and the implications for patient care when hospital services are disrupted. His work on ambulance services, including contributions to a series on a provincial ambulance crisis, examines how delays and staffing shortages affect response times and public confidence in emergency care. During the COVID-19 pandemic he has been part of data-driven reporting that looks at how the crisis reshaped the province, linking demographic and behavioural changes to pressures on schools, hospitals and other public infrastructure.
Across these pieces he tends to foreground the human impact of system strain, using clear accounts from affected workers and residents rather than abstract metrics.
Transportation, wildfires and breaking news
Rapid, practical coverage of disruptions to daily life is another hallmark of Little’s reporting. His work on ferry cancellations has documented mechanical issues on key vessels serving the Sunshine Coast, explaining how problems on multiple ships cascaded into widespread delays and service gaps.
These stories are structured to give readers quick clarity on what has happened, which sailings are affected and how long disruptions may last, while also addressing the underlying maintenance and fleet challenges that drive recurring outages.
In wildfire coverage, such as an evacuation alert near Lions Bay, he focuses on timelines, official warnings and geographic details that matter to residents in the path of risk. The breaking-news style that runs through these transportation and wildfire pieces is anchored in concise updates and verified official information, but he consistently returns to how interruptions in mobility and safety intersect with schools, workplaces and family routines.
Digital reporting, awards and past outlets
Little works as a digital and broadcast journalist, and his current role at CBC News follows years reporting for other major outlets in the same region. Before joining the CBC he reported for Global News and for a prominent talk radio station, experience that gave him a deep familiarity with local politics, crime, transportation and community issues. That breadth shows up in his CBC work, where he moves between education, health, emergency services and transportation while keeping a consistent focus on timeliness and clarity.
His digital strengths have been recognized with a Radio Television Digital News Association award for breaking news and a B.C.
Association of Broadcasters award for excellence in news reporting, and he has been named in regional journalism awards for collaborative projects on COVID’s impact and ambulance services. Across outlets he maintains a straightforward, fact-driven style that prioritizes verified information, clear chronology and the immediate consequences of public decisions for people who rely on schools, hospitals and core services.
4 more education journalists.
Abby Russchen
Abby Russchen ties education, community institutions and individual stories together, showing how policies and decisions register in people’s lives. She reports for CBC on education and community life, working across text, video and photography for different CBC platforms. Her education coverage centres student achievement, provincial and national test results, classroom technology and the forces shaping learning conditions, connecting policy language and expert analysis to observable changes in performance. She treats AI, screens and digital tools as part of the education beat, focusing on their impact on student well-being. She also reports on community institutions and local services, from bank closures and changing city status to small-business growth. Her human-interest features follow people, public memory and recognition, and her long-form background supports detailed, fact-grounded narratives across formats.
Alexa Phillips
Alexa Phillips reports on education as a financial system, tracing who pays, who benefits and who bears the risk when policy changes reshape schools and universities. She covers education policy, funding and regulation for The i Paper, with a consistent focus on money, power and their impact on students and staff. Her reporting follows fees, budgets and reform into classrooms and lecture halls, using concrete figures to show how tax changes, funding mechanisms and loan reforms translate into course cuts, job losses and access. Phillips brings wider experience on public services and regulation, including work on gambling oversight and healthcare access, so education sits in a larger accountability story. She writes straightforward, reported news pieces that combine policy detail, financial data and case studies, built from official records and regular call‑outs to readers affected by the systems she covers.
Alexandra Holyk
Alexandra Holyk is a multi-skilled journalist at CTV News who reports on education and youth issues through the daily lives of students, families, and local communities. She covers school and campus decisions, student safety, youth behaviour, and neighbourhood incidents, with a focus on how they affect the people directly involved. Her work includes stories on graduation choices, concerns about Black students in a school board, federal research funding at the University of Waterloo, and students who helped after a cyclist collision. She also covers vandalism and other local disruptions around schools and neighbourhoods. Holyk pitches, researches, shoots, writes, edits, and presents stories for broadcast and digital platforms. Her previous work includes video journalism for provincial coverage, along with reporting for campus and regional outlets and major Canadian newspapers and business media.
Annabelle Olivier
Annabelle Olivier ties system-level themes in Quebec’s school system to the immediate realities of parents and students, treating education as a lived experience rather than an abstract policy field. She is a digital journalist with CBC News, covering education and related public policy. Her work spans data breaches and digital privacy in schools, institutional conflicts and labour disputes that disrupt study plans, education on the campaign trail, and school infrastructure and land use. She reports on incidents like mass emails exposing sensitive parent data, suspended classes that leave students feeling like bargaining chips, and proposals to turn racetracks into schools. Her background in digital production at another major Canadian broadcaster shapes an online-first reporting style, grounded in specific incidents, clear descriptions, and detailed, verifiable facts drawn from documents, statements and interviews.