Kudos to 2 ND Alumnae for their parts in a Pulitzer Prize winning Chicago Tribune team...

came across this article in my "Echoes" email. Would be great to have alums like these share thoughts on the OF someday...

Note: For those near the campus...there might be an opportunity to interact with them...[At 1 p.m. on Friday, Nov. 20, Pérez and Buckley will have a conversation with fellow alumnus, journalist, and Pulitzer-winner Carlos Lozada ’93 in the Sojourner Truth Commons on the third floor of O’Shaughnessy Hall. }
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Arts & Letters alumnae part of Pulitzer Prize-winning team for their coverage with the Chicago Tribune
September 07, 2026
Adah McMillan

Two smiling women, one with dark hair, the other with brown hair, look right and smile at a phone propped up on a table.

Adriana Pérez interviews over video call an immigrant whose partner was arrested while they were in the car with their kids. He was sent to a detention center in Michigan and later deported, and his partner followed him back to Venezuela later.

Operation Midway Blitz was getting underway. Hundreds of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents were being deployed in the Chicago region, apprehending thousands of people.

Adriana Pérez ’22 was working her Sunday breaking news shift.

The Chicago Tribune reporter normally writes about the environment and climate change, but as one of the newspaper’s native Spanish speakers, she was sent to find and interview witnesses of one of the first arrests: a flower vendor who was picked off the street on Sept. 7, 2025, and deported to Mexico a few days later.

For the next two months, more arrests were made, and more stories needed to be told. Pérez paused much of her environment writing to continue interviewing and writing about Spanish-speaking ICE detainees and their families.

And she wasn’t working alone — far from it. The Chicago Tribune’s staff of more than 70 reporters, editors, and photojournalists — plus journalists at other publications throughout the city — dug deep into the stories coming to light in their community, ranging from safety risks of ICE tactics to Dr. Phil’s involvement in the immigration raids.

One of Pérez’s collaborators was Madeline Buckley ’11, who shares with Pérez both a workplace and a status as an alumna of the University of Notre Dame’s Gallivan Program in Journalism, Ethics, and Democracy (JED).

“Everyone feels so connected to Chicago and really wants to do right by Chicago, and I think all of that came through in the reporting.” - Madeline Buckley ’11, Chicago Tribune reporter

As a criminal justice reporter, Buckley covered legal issues around immigration arrests, among other topics. She debunked misinformation about protesters and detainees and, for one article, she and two other journalists investigated the Trump administration’s claims about violence perpetrated by protesters against immigration agents. Along with her colleagues, she analyzed court records and attempted to reach about 100 protesters. The resulting story revealed that many of the administration’s claims were untrue, and numerous cases weren’t holding up in court.

“It was an all-hands-on-deck situation,” Pérez said.

The Pulitzer Prize Board recognized the extraordinary efforts of the entire Chicago Tribune staff and awarded the newsroom the 2026 Pulitzer Prize in the Local Reporting category for their “powerful coverage.” They were also a finalist in the Public Service category.

At 1 p.m. on Friday, Nov. 20, Pérez and Buckley will have a conversation with fellow alumnus, journalist, and Pulitzer-winner Carlos Lozada ’93 in the Sojourner Truth Commons on the third floor of O’Shaughnessy Hall. They’ll discuss the politics of immigration reporting, the state of local news, and the Pulitzer Prize.

“Everyone at the Tribune was so dedicated and committed to telling the story,” Buckley said. “Everyone feels so connected to Chicago and really wants to do right by Chicago, and I think all of that came through in the reporting.”

From curiosity to climate change coverage

Though coming from a family of journalists, Pérez didn’t attend Notre Dame with plans to follow in their footsteps. She initially majored in psychology, and when she heard about the JED program, she applied more out of curiosity than ambition.

But journalism must be genetic — Pérez loved it instantly.

The JED minor felt different from other classes — instead of MLA-formatted essays and reading textbooks, Pérez wrote magazine articles and studied the front page of The New York Times.

“It felt like I was learning about the world as things were happening,” she said.

Pérez quickly realized she wanted to switch her major to political science to better complement her new aspirations. The major helped her learn more about the people and systems she hoped to report on while giving her the flexibility to take classes related to her specific interests.

One writing seminar, The Politics of Borders, still influences the way Pérez approaches immigration. A main focus of the class was the importance of language when talking and writing about immigrants. Pérez learned that using terms like “masses” or “a wave” when describing immigrants can diminish individuality and dehumanize a vulnerable population. The class also discussed the moral implications of journalistic voyeurism — when a reporter infiltrates a community and uses their experiences for a story without contributing anything in return.

“Reporting is not just about grabbing their story and putting it on the page and never hearing from them again,” Pérez said. “You are there, in a way, to tell their story to their benefit.”

Pérez’s desire to help the communities she covers has always been central to her journalism career and has guided her toward environmental reporting.

She began at the Tribune as a breaking news intern, a role she secured through the JED program, and was hired full-time soon after. Within a year, Pérez’s editor asked what she wanted to do in the long term.

“Asking thoughtful questions, being curious — it’s a muscle you work on, and I wouldn’t have the basis for it if it wasn’t for my liberal arts education at Notre Dame.” - Adriana Pérez ’22, Chicago Tribune reporter

Her answer was something that’s easier said than done: fighting climate change.

“It’s the crisis of my generation,” she said. “And I realized I can address this problem from my place, from my talents and my passion.”

Pérez is originally from Ecuador, where many of the climate crisis’s most prominent stories take place: deforestation in the Amazon rainforest, plastic pollution in the Pacific Ocean, and overfishing in the Galapagos Islands. When people talk about climate change, she said, these are the landscapes and the problems that first come to mind.

When it comes to climate coverage, she admits the Midwest doesn’t get as much of the spotlight — not because its ecosystems are less important or less in danger. The Great Lakes, wetlands, and prairies have their own roles and needs, she said, so Chicagoans don’t need to look far to find nature they can protect.

“My job is saying, ‘There are things around you that you should care about,’” Pérez said. “And that’s very meaningful to me.”

She’s now been writing about the environment for three years, covering issues like intensifying heat waves, wildlife conservation, and the potential impacts of data centers. Through her work, Pérez serves the public while satisfying the curiosity that drew her to journalism in the first place.

“Asking thoughtful questions, being curious — it’s a muscle you work on, and I wouldn’t have the basis for it if it wasn’t for my liberal arts education at Notre Dame,” she said.

Think critically to make a better world

Before she was a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, Buckley was just a Notre Dame first-year student trying to get involved on campus.

She found her way to The Observer, a student newspaper serving the Notre Dame, Saint Mary’s College, and Holy Cross College campuses. Buckley wrote news stories and designed pages for the print paper while making lifelong friends, learning about her new home, and sparking her interest in journalism.

“It pretty much just immediately sucked me in,” she said.

Applying for the JED minor was the natural next step, and picking her major became a search for the best supplement to a journalism education. Buckley found American studies, which examines many important topics in American life and history. She said it was perfect preparation for a profession that requires knowledge about a little bit of everything.

During her four years, Buckley remained active at The Observer, eventually becoming a news editor and then managing editor.

“That was great training for being a journalist because you learn how to mine every aspect of your life for potential story ideas,” she said.

She gained off-campus experience through three journalism internships — at the South Bend Tribune, the Concord Monitor in New Hampshire, and the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette in Pennsylvania — with help from JED connections. By the time she got her diploma, Buckley was more than ready to become a full-time reporter.

She started out at the Brownsville Herald in small-town Texas, and then made her way to larger cities with bigger papers — back to the South Bend Tribune, then to The Indianapolis Star.

“I’m still learning new things every day, but those Arts & Letters classes teach you to think critically, which is an essential skill for journalists.” - Madline Buckley ’11, Chicago Tribune reporter

But Buckley grew up in Chicago’s suburbs, so working at the Chicago Tribune was always her dream. When the paper had an opening, she jumped at the opportunity.

“It’s a good feeling to have an impact in the place where you’re from,” she said.

Now Buckley has been with the Tribune for the last nine years, and while there’s definitely some childhood familiarity, her work has introduced her to new parts of the city. As a crime and courts reporter, Buckley digs into Cook County’s criminal justice policies and covers major trials that shape Chicago life.

For Buckley, reporting is more than sharing legal details and statistics, and more than telling individual stories — it’s writing the first draft of history, putting events into context. It requires the ability to analyze, which Buckley credits to her college days.

“I’m still learning new things every day, but those Arts & Letters classes teach you to think critically, which is an essential skill for journalists,” she said. “We have to evaluate our information for accuracy and for fairness and to make sure it merits publishing.”

It’s a significant undertaking, especially in one of the biggest cities in the country, but Buckley said she can’t imagine doing anything else.

“A lot of journalists will say, ‘We’re not doing it for the awards,’ and it’s a cliche, but I do think it’s true,” Buckley said. “Our main mission is to make the city a better place, and that is what will guide us going forward.”
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