Where research and storytelling meet: Meet new grad Maeve Ellis

This spring, Maeve Ellis starts her career as a reporter and associate producer for CBC Saskatchewan.

Maeve Ellis was interested in journalism long before she began her undergraduate studies at the University of Toronto. Rather than enrolling in a journalism program after high school, the class of 2026 grad chose a pair of Faculty of Arts & Science majors to prepare for the contemporary newsroom.

“I chose economics and history because I wanted to understand how the world works,” Ellis said in a recent interview. “Economics taught me how to analyze information and data and history taught me how to read texts critically and analyze source material. Together, they gave me a really strong foundation for research and storytelling.”

In a world where the term "evidence-based" is often just a catch phrase, Ellis knows exactly what it means and has already started applying it to her trade. Three years on the staff of the Varsity, combined with an internship at the Investigative Journalism Foundation gave Ellis an audience for sharing data-driven work that centres on what is factual, methodologically sound and proven.

“I’ve written several articles that were built entirely on the data analysis skills I learned in U of T economics courses,” she said. “For one piece, I analyzed City of Toronto data on waterfowl counts at beaches and found a significant decline in bird populations. The process involved doing the analysis myself and then speaking to experts to verify it, which is very similar to what we do in investigative journalism.”

Practical skills for an evolving media industry

While Ellis says she doesn’t know what journalism – or longstanding media outlets – will look like in the future, she believes the skills she has learned over the course of her degree can be applied to a variety of professions and contexts using emerging tools and technologies.

“At the Investigative Journalism Foundation, we used AI tools to summarize vast amounts of information,” she said, “but the most important part was still having journalists verify everything afterward. Using data tools efficiently while keeping human judgment at the centre is something my economics training prepared me well for.”

In a competitive job market, Ellis focused on applying what she has learned in class and demonstrated in newsrooms to set herself apart.

“My economics degree was integral to how I presented myself in job interviews,” she remembered. “Skills like data analysis from Introduction to Data Analysis and Applied Econometrics (ECO220), working with R and Stata, and being comfortable with numbers, budgets and spreadsheets really helped set me apart. Even in journalism – where economics isn’t always expected – it gave me a distinct advantage.”

Preparing for her first job in journalism

This spring, Ellis starts her career as reporter and associate producer for CBC Saskatchewan. She is preparing for smaller town life under the bigger prairie skies.

“I’ve only ever lived in Toronto, so moving to Saskatoon will be a big change,” Ellis said. “I’ve heard people are more outgoing and open to conversation there, which I think will be helpful for journalism. A lot of the job is talking to people, building trust and finding story ideas, so I’m excited to experience that.”

Originally published by the Faculty of Arts & Science