Work Samples for MH
To see more of my work, please visit: https://seymabayram.com/writing
1) Seyma Bayram, “The failed Akron Innerbelt drove decades of racial inequity. Can the damage be repaired?,” Akron Beacon Journal, February 3, 2022: https://www.beaconjournal.com/in-depth/news/2022/02/03/akron-innerbelt-history-racial-inequity-black-history-urban-renewal-ohio/9033520002/
This is a longform enterprise story on the Akron Innerbelt, a never-completed highway that tore apart Black neighborhoods in Akron, Ohio and displaced at least 737 families in the 1960s and 1970s. The story is one in a two-part series. My story includes original and previously unpublished reporting on an important part of local history. It also showcases my narrative writing and investigative reporting skills, including archival research — a tool I particularly enjoy using. To report the story, I drew on census data, property records, documents from the Ohio Department of Transportation, and mayoral papers housed at the University of Akron. I also chose to eliminate a source after discovering, through those records, that she had been displaced not by the Innerbelt but by another urban renewal project. It wasn’t that she was lying; rather, the neighborhood where the source grew up had undergone three consecutive urban renewal projects, which led to her confusion. This story won an AP award and is republished in a forthcoming anthology from the University of Akron Press.
2) Seyma Bayram, “Columbia Secondary School faces student protests and teacher exodus under new leadership,” Chalkbeat, June 30, 2025: https://www.chalkbeat.org/newyork/2025/06/30/columbia-secondary-school-teacher-exodus-sparks-student-protest/
This recent story on upheaval at a New York City public school highlights my investigative reporting sensibilities. Reporting on schools can be notoriously challenging, but I conducted interviews with 16 sources — including current and former students and teachers — and obtained numerous visual and text-based documents to fact-check and guide my reporting. The documents and data I obtained and analyzed helped cut through much of the noise I encountered during the reporting process.
3) Seyma Bayram and Doug Livingston, “‘The emotions are on a huge spectrum’: Inside one of Ohio's few remaining abortion clinics,” Akron Beacon Journal, March 24, 2022: https://seymabayram.com/abortion-main
Note: Because the story is behind a paywall on the Akron Beacon Journal website, I have included a link to the story as it appears on my personal website. Another story in this series explores how Catholic Democrats in Akron helped write the conservative playbook to overturn Roe.
This is a longform enterprise story, one in a four-part series, on abortion access in Ohio before the fall of Roe v. Wade. I was the lead reporter and writer on this main story, which I co-reported with my former Akron Beacon Journal colleague Doug Livingston. To report this story, I spent several weeks embedded in a Northeast Ohio abortion clinic. I am proud that we were able to gain the trust of staff and patients at the clinic and I am proud of our reporting and writing. I also loved collaborating with Doug, who contributed invaluable data reporting to the project. Our series won two awards, including a first place AP award.
4) Seyma Bayram and Rebecca Hersher, “A new satellite could help clean up the air in America's most polluted neighborhoods,” National Public Radio, June 19, 2023: https://www.npr.org/2023/06/19/1179670466/air-pollution-satellite-baltimore-climate-change
I was the lead reporter and writer on this co-reported radio and digital story on a new NASA satellite instrument which promises to close critical information gaps on air pollution. I’m also the narrator of the feature radio story. My colleague Rebecca Hersher and I told this story through the experiences of residents in Curtis Bay, a working-class neighborhood in Baltimore with some of the highest air pollution levels in the country. I’m proud of how we were able to convey the human costs of air pollution, and it was a joy to work with Rebecca. This story highlights my ability to write for the ear and to break down complex topics for a large audience.
5) Seyma Bayram, “A Colorful History: Can the Sun-N-Sand Be Saved?,” Jackson Free Press December 11, 2019: https://www.jacksonfreepress.com/news/2019/dec/11/colorful-past-can-sun-n-sand-be-saved/
This story about efforts to save a local landmark, the Sun-N-Sand Motor Hotel in Jackson, Mississippi, from being demolished and turned into a parking lot was a joy to write and report. I explored the motel’s significance in Mississippi's literary, racial, political and architectural history. I am proud of my research and writing. I won an AP award for this story.