Alia Wong

Alia Wong is an award-winning reporter based in Washington, D.C., who covers inequities in education for USA TODAY.

Her coverage, from breaking news to months-long feature projects, spans all education levels and settings, including child care, K-12 schools and postsecondary institutions. Alia previously worked as a staff writer and associate editor at The Atlantic, where she developed its education section. Born and raised in Hawai‘i, she began her journalism career as a reporter at Honolulu Civil Beat. Among her award-winning stories have been a series on Hawaiian immersion schools and investigations into the handling of concussions by high-school athletic programs.

Alia has immersed herself in schools on the Pine Ridge reservation and in a college in the process of shutting down. She has spent days in classrooms with preschoolers still learning how to talk and third-graders still learning how to read. Her work has been supported by various fellowships, including through the Education Writers Association and the Institute for Citizens & Scholars. Alia graduated summa cum laude from Boston University in May 2012 with degrees in journalism and Latin American studies. She attended BU as a Martin Luther King Jr. scholar.