Reveal, The Center for Investigative Reporting
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While in graduate school, Brett moonlit as a production assistant on the award-winning audio team of reporters, producers, and engineers churning out weekly episodes.
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She worked on investigative projects from pitch to publish: archival research, pulling great takes, editing, mixing, and honing my amateur sound design skills. In June 2021, she got to help produce a show she co-reported: the methane hour, Emission Control.
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You can find her show bylines here.
production and research
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Investigative Reporting Program, Aging in America
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Over Brett's two years at Berkeley, she worked as a lead graduate researcher at the Investigative Reporting Program, working on Geeta Anand's investigation of the elder care industry. They set out in 2019 already convinced that this was one of America's most crucial stories.
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With the pandemic, their reporting became more urgent than ever. In spring 2020, Brett followed the Bay Area's only senior shelter through the lockdown for the The New York Times. In November 2020, she interviewed a family grappling with at-home care after an assisted living facility outbreak for a KQED radio story.
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Finally, she followed an elderly homeless couple's journey over more than a year of the pandemic. This account ran in The New York Times in July 2021.
U.C. Berkeley Human Rights Center Investigations Lab
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In summer 2020, Brett's plans to report on a Norwegian copper mine with a fellowship with the Human Rights Center were sidetracked. So she took the year as an opportunity to get involved in the Center's Investigations Lab, working on a cross-disciplinary team using OSINT techniques to investigate human rights abuses in the copper industry in the Democratic Republic of Congo.
The Science of Happiness Podcast, Greater Good Science Center
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From January to June 2020, Brett was the Associate Producer of The Science of Happiness Podcast, co-produced by UC Berkeley's Greater Good Science Center and PRX. The show has over 15 million downloads, and has featured guests like Michael Lewis and Margaret Cho.
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She worked behind the scenes on all aspects of the biweekly show assembly: writing show notes, brainstorming titles, reaching out to guests, conducting expert interviews, working with illustrators, building audiograms, webifying transcripts, and pressing publish.