By Ben Giles | Arizona Capitol Times
Fernanda Santos is putting down roots in Arizona. The Brazilian-born journalist spent 12 years at the New York Times, including the past five as a correspondent based in Arizona. When faced with a decision to continue at the newspaper or stay in Phoenix, she chose the desert. Now she’ll teach a new generation of journalists at Arizona State University, where she’ll serve as a Southwest Borderlands Initiative professor, a job that affords her ample opportunity to continue her own reporting on the Arizona story.
Why was it time to leave the Times?
I think it had to do with both a feeling on the professional end of things that I had been there for 12 years, and there was no major challenge there for me that I felt excited about. And also on the personal side, it made a lot of sense when I moved here to Arizona in 2012, and having been here for five years and counting with my family in Phoenix, it sort of made sense to us to stick around a little longer.
