ABOUT

Alex Ruppenthal is an award-winning journalist in Chicago, where he covers the environment, public health and a range of other issues.

His work has appeared in Chicago magazine, the Chicago Tribune, the website of WTTW (Chicago PBS), ESPNChicago.com, NBC Sports Chicago and other publications, and he has contributed reporting to ProPublica Illinois and WBEZ. Alex’s work has been featured by the Associated Press, NPR, WBEZ, WLS-890 AM and other outlets.

Alex has been recognized as an RK Mellon Fellow by the Society of Environmental Journalists, an investigative reporting fellow by the New England First Amendment Coalition and a guest lecturer as part of Northwestern University’s “Reporting Islam” project.

His work has earned him honors from the New England Newspaper & Press Association, the Hearst Foundation and the Associated Press Sports Editors.

Most importantly, Alex’s reporting has played a role in spurring important policy and regulatory changes, including a federal crackdown on polluters of brain-damaging manganese dust, a renewed investigation of a youth gymnastics coach who was later charged with sexual assault and the resignation of a 30-year police officer with a long history of misconduct. 

Alex is a proud graduate of the School of Journalism at the University of Missouri, where he also earned a Bachelor of Arts in German. Alex then continued his studies at Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität in Munich during a fellowship program sponsored by the U.S. State Department and German Bundestag. 

Originally from Chicago, Alex enjoys following his hometown baseball team (the North Side one), keeping his German sharp (better after a beer or three) and railing about bad public transportation. (Did he mention puns?) Some fun facts about Alex: He nearly died playing Wiffle ball, was a state champion bowler at age 12 and survived a week-long bout with the E. coli bacteria.