About

Education has always been an important part of my life.

As a first-generation American and the daughter of Vietnamese refugees, my parents always impressed on me that the path to a good life — a life better than the ones they left behind — would come through a college degree. This degree, they said, would net me a good job with a steady income and a world free from the toil they experienced assimilating to the United States.

My parents were right. I graduated from Arizona State University after landing a full-ride scholarship, and, in 2005, earned my undergraduate degree in journalism. That degree helped me land my first newspaper job at my hometown daily, The Arizona Republic, where I made a living telling stories about the community around me.

As a reporter, my editors always impressed on me that the path to a good career — a career full of stories that served the public good — would come through educating myself to educate others.

My editors were right. As a reporter for the last seven years, I have committed myself to cultivating sources, talking with experts, slogging through documents and immersing myself in the issues I cover. I’ve discovered that the best thing about being a journalist is getting paid to learn new things and tell others about it through my reporting.

This year education takes on a new meaning for me in two ways. Not only am I back in school as a graduate student at American University, but I’m also working part-time covering education in Montgomery County at The Washington Post. I’ll spend this year working with editors at the Post and professors at American University to learn to be a better journalist. I’ll also spend this year as a reporter learning how others learn, with the end goal of illuminating how parents, teachers and policymakers in Montgomery County go about the business of educating nearly 150,000 students in the nation’s 17thlargest school system.

This blog aims to be a central meeting place for those interested in Montgomery County education. Here we’ll explore everything that matters in education: test scores, teacher evaluations, student life, college access, the Montgomery County Public Schools’ budget, the achievement gap and everything in between.

I invite you to join the community and get involved. Send story ideas and suggestions to lynhbui[at]gmail[dot]com and follow me on Twitter @ByLynhBui.

Tell me how education is an important part of your life.

Editor’s Note: Bui runs this blog as part of her Digital News and Social Media course at American University. Though this blog supplements her reporting as an education reporter for The Washington Post, Bui runs this site independently. The Post is not responsible for this website or its content.