Tess Ikonomou
Tess Ikonomou reports on how federal decisions shape institutions and everyday life, with a particular focus on education, young people and social services. She covers education for The Canberra Times within a broader federal politics beat as a staff journalist with Australian Associated Press. Her stories track the impact of policy on universities, youth justice, child care and household finances, rather than treating politics as a closed insider game.
Education policy and campus accountability
In her education coverage, Ikonomou frames universities and training providers as regulated institutions that owe duties to students and communities. Her reporting on universities facing fines for failing to stamp out racism focuses on how regulatory pressure is used to enforce standards of safety and inclusion, rather than on campus culture alone.
That structural focus carries over into her work on systems around young people, including a piece on youth justice that compared Australian detention outcomes to those in the United States and found Australia doing worse by key measures. She treats youth justice as an extension of how the state manages education, rehabilitation and long-term prospects for children, not just as a legal story.
Her article on declining numbers of day care services and rising costs, which highlighted a report calling for financial backing for providers, applies the same lens to early childhood care and education. She connects fees, access and service viability back to the practical experiences of families using these services, grounding policy debate in day-to-day consequences.
Federal politics and economic decisions
Ikonomou is a federal political reporter with Australian Associated Press, working from the Canberra press gallery and covering election campaigns and major international meetings. She has reported on Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s meeting with Xi Jinping in China and the NATO Summit in Madrid, underscoring a remit that stretches from domestic politics into international diplomacy.
Her coverage of interest rates and inflation includes a piece drawing on remarks from the Reserve Bank’s deputy governor, who warned that Australians were “furious” about rising costs and that it would take years to get on top of post-pandemic living expenses. In that story she ties monetary policy decisions directly to household budgets, presenting economic settings as a political choice with long-term social consequences.
Her work often returns to the theme of political accountability, such as reporting on “massive loopholes” that allow lobbyists continued access despite concerns about undue influence over public decision-making. By foregrounding the mechanics of access and lobbying rules, she positions federal politics as a system that can be interrogated and reformed, not just a sequence of speeches and votes.
Accountability in lobbying and justice
Across her justice-focused reporting, Ikonomou examines whether legal and administrative frameworks meet contemporary standards of fairness. Her youth justice piece contrasts Australia’s performance with that of the United States to argue that even countries known for tough law-and-order policies can outperform Australia on rehabilitation and outcomes.
In her work on lobbying rules, she highlights how exemptions and procedural gaps can allow well-connected actors to maintain influence over public policy despite attempts to regulate them. Taken together, these stories show a consistent interest in whether the architecture of government aligns with its stated values, especially when decisions affect vulnerable or less visible groups.
Public services, security and global engagement
Ikonomou’s reporting also covers the practical side of public services, from border processes to defence arrangements. Her co-authored piece on Australia axing paper arrival cards, replacing them with a digital system, focuses on how changes in administration can remove friction from travel and modernise government interfaces.
On defence and security, she has written about Australia’s participation in AUKUS, including concerns that promised nuclear-powered submarines may not be delivered because the US Navy is struggling to meet its own production targets. She has also covered regional and global security issues such as conflict around the Strait of Hormuz, drawing on expert analysis to explain why US allies and partners are being urged to cooperate to secure the waterway while avoiding uncritical support for Washington.
Her reporting for outlets beyond The Canberra Times, including work for a public sector-focused masthead, often looks at how defence and service roles are opening to new groups, such as New Zealanders and permanent residents being able to apply to join the Australian military. These stories reinforce a broader pattern in her work: attention to the lived impact of policy, whether it concerns who can serve, how people move through borders, or how security commitments translate into material capabilities.
4 more education journalists.
Bridie Short
Bridie Short reports on how learning environments shape young people’s experiences and their engagement with wider issues. She writes about education for Lynn News, a local news publication with a focus on community stories. Her coverage centres on classrooms and other learning settings, with attention to the people and events that define daily life there. She has written about drama students paying homage to the climate emergency with a performance, framing their creative response as part of their educational experience and blending arts coverage with an education lens. Her education reporting sits within a broader community news agenda, linking school and college stories to general news. Her pieces are grounded in concrete events and activities, showing what students and staff are doing rather than focusing on abstract policy.
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.