***Nirvi Shah
 

 

Email

 

 

Work Experience

 

The Miami Herald, staff writer September 2006 to present

*Cover Broward and Miami-Dade public schools, with 600,000 students combined, as part of a team of reporters

*Documented one district’s failure to follow a federal law requiring free tutoring for thousands of students

*Showed one district’s efforts to diversify gifted programs were unsuccessful

*Captured the growing trend of children improving reading skills by reading aloud to animals

*Regularly enhance print coverage with audio reports and by breaking news stories online

*Awards include 2007 Florida Press Club award, 2nd place, education writing; 2007 Florida Society of Professional Journalists award, 2nd place, education writing

 

 

The Palm Beach Post, staff writer (West Palm Beach, Fla.) August 2000 to August 2006

*Covered Palm Beach County schools, Palm Beach County government, and St. Lucie County schools as well as breaking cops, courts and other news, including several hurricanes

*Documented how a state education plan was designed to leave thousands of students from being counted under the federal No Child Left Behind law

*Chronicled the journey of teachers to a Marine boot camp where the military hoped they would learn to become passive recruiters in American high schools

*Created a cooking column for one of the fastest-growing segments of society: singles.

*Awards include 2006 Green Eyeshade Award, 3rd place, breaking news; 2006 Florida Society of Professional Journalists award, 1st place, education writing

*2002 education writing fellow, Knight Center for Specialized Journalism, University of Maryland

 

 

  The Ledger, staff writer (Lakeland, Fla.) August 1999 to August 2000

*Covered the public school district and more than 30 private schools; wrote a weekly series exploring school curriculum

*Wrote about employees from a private firm trying to earn money undoing a multimillion-dollar mistake they created when they were employed by the school district

 

 

Reporting Internships

*St. Petersburg Times: May to August 1999; The Atlanta Journal & Constitution: June to August 1998; The Ledger, May to August 1997

 

  

The Independent Florida Alligator (Gainesville, Fla.) January 1997 to May 1999

*Freelance editor, minority affairs beat writer, columnist while studying abroad

  

 

Departure:GNV August 1995 to August 1997

*Editor-in-chief of the University of Florida's largest literary-art journal; oversaw publishing of the magazine's first online edition in 1997

*Published short stories in the journal

 

 

Suwannee-St. Johns Sierra Club August 1997 to December 1997

*Newsletter editor and designer

 

Education

 

University of Florida,  graduated May 1999

*Bachelor of Science in Journalism with highest honors

*Minor in environmental studies     

University of Salamanca, Spain, spring semester 1998

*Studied economics, art history and Spanish grammar while living with a Spanish family

 

 

Special Skills

 

*Conversational Spanish

*Conversational Gujarati (an Indian language)

*Comfortable with a variety of software, including Excel, Audacity and Soundslides

 

 

Activities and Interests

 

*Member, Education Writers Association

*Member, Asian American Journalists Association

*Member, Florida Press Club

*Member, Florida Society of Professional Journalists

*Volunteering: Currently with West Palm 100, a civic organization; past volunteer with Big Brothers, Big Sisters

*Avid reader, from the Harry Potter series to Hemingway to history

*Cooking and learning about food and agriculture; currently learning to work on a farm

                   

 

References

 

*Available upon request