From the indictment of Rod Blagojevich to Biden’s 2020 presidential campaign, to covering immigration to Chicago politics, Natasha Korecki has been through it all.

A graduate of Saint Viator High School in Arlington Heights, Illinois, Korecki attended the University in the fall of 1992 with no real goal in mind, taking her first journalism class as an elective her sophomore year.

“I always felt like I came in really late to journalism,” Korecki said. “I was a fish out of water — I didn’t know what I was doing.”

While she felt that she wasn’t at the level of her colleagues, she enjoyed the course and the professor, Jean McDonald, reminiscing on one of her first assignments.

“I chose to follow this homeless man around,” Korecki said. “I spent the day with him and I bought him lunch so I could get him to sit down, trust me and talk to me. He started devouring this Burger King sandwich and the sauce from it was just dripping down his face. He didn’t bother cleaning it, he was so hungry.” 

She talked about how she was able to write this story and how it changed her, just being able to describe someone’s story on a personal level.

“To be able to tell that story and to tell where he came from, it just really opened my eyes to this whole new world,” Korecki said.

After turning in the assignment, professor McDonald was blown away.

“It was a story that I remember to this day,” McDonald said. “It was well done, it was beyond expectations.”

McDonald later would read aloud a portion of that assignment to the class as an example.

“I don’t think I’ve ever read anyone else’s piece out loud to any class since,” McDonald said. “It was so much better than anyone else’s in the class that I wanted the others to see what could be done. I wanted them to hear it, not just read it.”

“As she started reading, I realized, ‘Oh my god, that’s my story,’” Korecki said. “To me it was such a confidence boost. I couldn’t believe that there was a profession that was this engrossing and fun, just something you woke up and wanted to do. I knew it after that class, so I walked over and changed my major immediately.”

Korecki would go on to finish her degree in journalism in 1996, applying for the University of Illinois at Springfield’s master’s in Public Affairs Reporting program where they paired her up with the Daily Herald.

Years later she became the federal courts reporter for the Chicago Sun-Times, covering the trials of former governors Rod Blagojevich and George Ryan.

“You have a front-row seat to history,” Korecki said. “There were just moments of absurdity. Everything happens in a courtroom. You watch people laugh, you watch them cry, you watch the anguish on a child’s face when their father is getting sentenced.”

Later she joined POLITICO, often joking that she went on to cover politicians earlier in their careers.

She acknowledged the difficulty of being the only woman in the courtroom, with many of the judges, attorneys and security guards being male. Early on in her career she often looked to senior reporters at the Chicago Sun-Times like Fran Spielman and Carol Marin for guidance and support.

“(Carol Marin) is just like a saint who’s helped me through so many challenges. We both have sons with special needs and she’s just helped coach me through it. She said she wants to pay it forward because someone was there for her.”

She has tried to follow that same goal, advising expecting reporters. 

“You can be a great mom, you can never miss a field trip and you can also kick ass,” Korecki said.

As a child of immigrants herself, she participated in an immigration project, traveling through the countryside of Mexico for a month. The project’s goal was to trace back people who lived in the Chicago area and visit their hometowns to get an image of the environment and a picture of border security. 

For her work she was recognized as a Livingston Award finalist, which honors the best reporting and storytelling by young journalists.

“It was one of the most incredible things I’ve done and worked on,” Korecki said. “Getting to know these people, getting to know their stories, telling their stories and following up with them afterward, it was satisfying in a lot of ways, it helped humanize these people.”

It was these types of stories and moments that keeps her going.

“You’re not doing it for the money,” Korecki said.

Being a part of the Illini Media Hall of Fame class has brought a lot of reflection for the nationally renowned reporter, especially when considering the other inductees.

“I look at the other people who are a part of this Hall of Fame group like Will Leitch,” said Korecki. “I always looked at him like this genius and he was that. You knew that he was going to be somebody. He was light years ahead of everyone brain-wise. To be recognized with them in this, I’m completely honored.”

Leitch, however, felt similar feelings toward his former colleague in a newsletter published through Substack in 2019.

“Every story she wrote had some new detail in it that no one had, and she could make even the most dull campus parking story compulsively readable,” Leitch said. “She was a pure reporter in the way most of us were just pretending to be.”

Korecki continues to share her underdog story with young reporters, hoping to make the journey easier for others than it was for her. She advises people to be cautious of following the crowd, being skeptical, reading all the documents when covering a story and calling someone every day who scares you.

“They’re so mean, they’re so uncomfortable,” Korecki said. “They don’t want you to call them, they purposefully try to intimidate you. Do it, you’ll get more used to it and you won’t get intimidated by anyone.”

And for anyone who’s considering journalism:

“Being able to walk into a place like (The Daily Illini), the phones ringing, photographers running around, it was the quintessential idea of what a newsroom looked like and felt like,” Korecki said. “You have to do it to know.”

@JonathanAlday7

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