One part of the writing test I took at Columbia for my application was this question (and I’m paraphrasing): What is one news story the media have not covered enough and how should they cover it?

I said legal and illegal immigrants – the actual people, the ones behind the politicized debate over immigration policy. I’m not really sure why I wrote about that. I know very little about it, and maybe that’s why I chose it – surely if the media were covering the topic well I wouldn’t be so ignorant. My not-very-organized little essay ended up mostly pointing out why the media don’t cover these stories well: We don’t speak multiple languages, we don’t have the time or money to access interpreters, we could harm people by reporting about illegal immigrants, there is no obvious “timeliness” and it requires access to reporter-repellent institutions like schools, hospitals and private businesses.

All of that made me particularly pleased and impressed to see the NYT’s ongoing series “Remade in America: The Newest Immigrants and Their Impact.” Mostly I was impressed with myself for identifying and poorly describing a major NYT project before it launched. The interactive maps are really fun to play around with, as usual, and I liked this story because it’s about Minneapolis.