Lee V. Gaines
Lee V. Gaines was an investigative education reporter at WFYI until March 2025. Lee was previously an education reporter for Illinois Public Media / Illinois Newsroom. Her work has been heard on national broadcasts, including All Things Considered, Morning Edition and Here & Now.
Before joining public media, Lee’s reporting appeared in newspapers and magazines in Chicago and nationally, including the Chicago Tribune, Chicago Reader, Chicago Magazine, the Pacific Standard and the Marshall Project.
Lee is the recipient of numerous journalism awards, including a regional Edward R. Murrow award and the 2020 award for best nationally edited feature from the Public Media Journalists Association.
Lee was named the Indiana Journalist of the Year in 2024 by the Indiana Chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists.
Follow her on X at @LeeVGaines
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More than three years after ChatGPT debuted, AI has become a part of everyday life — and professors and students are still figuring out how or if they should use it. -
School districts are spending thousands of dollars on these tools, despite research showing the technology is far from reliable. -
Children who receive special education services were suspended more than twice as often from school as compared to their peers during the last academic year. -
Last school year about 72,700 public school students, or nearly 7% of those enrolled, experienced out-of-school suspensions. -
House Bill 1285 still includes a requirement that every Indiana school building has a staff member available to de-escalate behavior in situations where students may be secluded, restrained or put in timeout. -
Legal experts explain what rights immigrant students have and what public K-12 schools must provide to them. -
Purdue Professor William Watson explains about how AI could benefit teachers and students, the challenges it poses, and how it could transform the P-12 educational landscape. -
The parents of a 10-year-old boy who died by suicide earlier this year have filed a wrongful death lawsuit against the fourth grader’s school district, Greenfield-Central Community Schools. -
A new state law, prompted by a WFYI investigation, now requires the Indiana Commission on Seclusion and Restraint to meet twice per year. But the group has gone 14 months without a single meeting. -
Jon Shapiro and Kristina Wheeler won two at-large seats on the Carmel Clay School Board defeating two candidates running as a conservative slate.
