When I joined my school newspaper, the Berkeley High Jacket, at the start of my sophomore year, I was only looking to get a GPA boost and maybe make a few new friends. Three years of researching, interviewing and writing later, I’ve fallen in love with journalism. It constantly challenges me, slowly but surely making me into the type of person who strikes up conversations with strangers, sits on panels with audiences that number in the hundreds and drives school administrators crazy by asking questions that they really don’t want to answer. It’s not an easy career, but I know that it’s the right one for me.
So when my editors at The SUNN Post offered me the opportunity to shadow Megan Fan Munce, a climate reporter at the San Francisco Chronicle, I jumped at it. At just 26 years old, the former Hearst fellow and Northwestern grad is a 2026 Pulitzer Prize winner for her work on “Burned,” a series of articles detailing the failure of the insurance industry to support Californians who lost their homes to fire. Her success at such a young age makes her the perfect person to tell those of us considering a future in journalism what the job is like, where it’s headed and why it matters.
A Day in the Life
Although Munce’s schedule is rarely predictable, some patterns persist. I went to the Chronicle’s headquarters on a Friday, the quietest day of their week. Most of the cubicles lining the office were empty, but the staff present could be heard calling sources or talking to colleagues. While the buzz of conversation continues all day, Munce prefers to finish her interviews in the morning, either on the phone or at a coffee shop. A pause for lunch gives her time to regroup and absorb information, before pivoting to writing. That’s when she transfers the day’s revelations to documents and spreadsheets.
Sometimes, her schedule is disrupted by unexpected events, and she’ll end up on an impromptu trip. One time, she spent a day hiking in Marin County after a land purchase opened up new trails for public use; she’s also done trips related to the recent Los Angeles wildfires. “Journalism takes both the organization to…plot out what you’re going to do in your day, but also the ability to adapt really quickly when something happens,” she said.
A Snack in the Chronicle’s Freezer
When she isn’t writing or interviewing, Munce turns her attention to another investigation-worthy issue: The contents of the Chronicle’s freezer. One of the office’s greatest tragedies was the day Costco ice cream replaced the regular Häagen-Dazs. The sign atop Munce’s cubicle — which reads “ON STRIKE” — is a remembrance of the sad day and a warning to anyone who might attempt another such switch.
Highs and Lows
Journalism is a difficult field — it’s impossible to please everyone, and it requires a thick skin and plenty of motivation. But for Munce, “there’s no other role that’s as fulfilling.”
Her recent articles cover everything from drastic events like the Hawaii floods and a deadly avalanche to recent changes made by housing insurance companies, complete with tips for homeowners. Constantly reporting on the harmful effects of climate change can be frightening, but one of her colleagues told her something that resonated with her: “Writing about climate gives you the sort of reassurance that someone is doing something and you’re talking to them,” she said.
Through her reporting she aims to spread that same knowledge to her readers. She gets both angry emails — to which she responds with descriptions of the steps she took to make her work the best it could be, assuming that the senders are coming from a well-meaning place — and positive ones. A thank you letter from a reader is pinned to the back of her cubicle, where she can see it as she writes.
How Journalism Is Changing
Munce anticipates changes for the better and for the worse, both of which have to do with AI. On the one hand, the rise of artificial intelligence has inspired some to replace the work of human journalists with AI writing — Munce gave the example of the Cleveland Plain Dealer, an Ohio newspaper that has its reporters hand the actual writing off to AI and focus their attention solely on interviews and information gathering. Such strategies lose “the creativity that journalists can bring to writing and communication, and then the enjoyment that readers can get out of reading something that isn’t just about delivering the information, but is also about telling a story,” she said.
However, Munce thinks AI can be a useful tool in certain circumstances. At the Chronicle, it’s used to transcribe interviews and summarize videos and long documents. Chronicle reporters then confirm its findings, as it’s often “exaggerating… or misinterpreting certain things,” Munce said. Even so, AI helps her stay up to date on meetings she can’t attend in person and expedite the research process.
Why Climate Journalism Matters
As a climate reporter whose work focuses mainly on insurance, Munce has noticed that most people don’t realize that climate change affects them until they see how it changes their insurance bill. “Reporting on climate is a really important element to getting that information to people who might not know a lot about climate change and might not be paying as much attention to it,” she said, adding that a little prevention can go a long way. After the publication of “Burned,” multiple homeowners reached out to share that they had increased their insurance coverage after reading it. “Hopefully those people will never have their homes burned down in a wildfire,” Munce said, “but now we can say that there might be some people in the future whose homes burn down and who will be able to rebuild their homes because we helped let them know that their insurance coverage limits might be too low.”
To Munce, hearing that her work has impacted her readers is one of the most rewarding parts of her job. By giving voice to people who are struggling she is helping them directly, but also helping those around them to understand what their neighbors are going through. It’s “an important part of the job,” she said, “[to be] a player in helping a community feel like a community.”
