The Chicago Tribune and ProPublica have won a 2022 IRE Award for exposing how schools were working with local police to ticket students.
documented how thousands of Illinois students a year were receiving tickets at school for conduct that violated local laws. The tickets often involved behavior as minor as littering, vaping or getting into a hallway scuffle.The nonprofit organization Investigative Reporters and Editors gave the work the top prize in the large print/online division, honoring Tribune reporter Jennifer Smith Richards, ProPublica reporter Jodi S. Cohen and Tribune photographer Armando L. Sanchez.
Ticketing students violates the intent of an Illinois law that prohibits schools from fining students as a form of discipline. Instead of issuing fines directly, school officials refer students to police, who write the tickets. The fines attached can be hundreds of dollars, an impossible burden for many families. The reporters also found Black students were ticketed at higher rates than their white peers.
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