Junyao Yang

Junyao Yang is a multimedia journalist dedicated to telling the stories of marginalized and disadvantaged communities. She’s particularly interested in data journalism and open source investigation, devoted to utilizing data and visualization to tell stories that otherwise wouldn’t be discovered in the first place.

She is a student reporter at the UC Berkeley Investigative Reporting Program and mainly works on the California Reporting Project to report on police use of force in San Jose. She wrote for Richmond Confidential, covering stories from the widespread power outage in the city to Richmond HelloFresh workers unionizing drive.

Before joining the Berkeley Journalism School, she interned in major Chinese media outlets such as Caixin Media and the Paper, working on their data and graphics desk. Being both a woman and a journalist, she deeply cares about the predicaments of women and writes about taboo topics in China from period poverty and shaming to single women’s egg-freezing dilemma.

Junyao was born and raised in Zigong, a small city in southwestern China. She spent years in major cities in China including Beijing, Shanghai and Hangzhou, and is ready to take more adventures in the world.

EDUCATION

  • the University of California, Berkeley (2021-2023)

  • Zhejiang University, China (2016-2020)

EMPLOYERS

  • Caixin Media, Data Reporter Intern

  • The Paper, Data Reporter Intern

  • DataViz, Beijing, Data Editor Intern

  • China Central Television, Social Media Intern

REPORTING INTERESTS

Data Journalism, Graphics Reporting, Investigative reporting