Paloma Esquivel named Metro’s education investigative reporter

Sent on behalf of Deputy Managing Editor Shelby Grad:

We’re pleased to announce that Paloma Esquivel is Metro’s new education investigative reporter.

This is a new position that reflects the ongoing expansion of our education coverage and recognizes how the post-pandemic education world is going to require rigorous digging and accountability journalism.

Paloma is already known around the newsroom as one of our more furious and skilled diggers. She was a key member of the team that won the 2011 Pulitzer Prize for uncovering rampant corruption in Bell, a story that kept her in the city for months going through stacks of records and interviewing countless residents to uncover the scale of the wrongdoing. More recently, she has worked on investigations into serious problems at a well-known shelter for migrant children in L.A., sexual assaults at immigrant detention centers and the grim environmental and health burden of people who live near the Inland Empire’s booming logistics industry. For the last year, she has written a series of groundbreaking stories and exposed the deep inequities of remote learning and the toll it was taking on children in struggling communities.

Paloma started at The Times in 2007 through the Metpro program. She covered Orange County and later served as Inland Empire bureau chief. There, she was one of the first reporters on scene at the mass shooting in San Bernardino and was a key member of the team that won the Pulitzer for that coverage.

She will report to Deputy Metro Editor Stephanie Chavez.