Suzanne Perez
Education Reporter | Assistant News DirectorSuzanne Perez is a longtime journalist covering education and general news for KMUW and the Kansas News Service. Before coming to KMUW in 2021, Suzanne worked more than 30 years at The Wichita Eagle, where she covered schools and a variety of other topics. In addition to her news reporting, Suzanne reviews books for KMUW, co-hosts the monthly Books & Whatnot podcast and helps lead the station’s monthly Literary Feast book club. She created the #ReadICT Reading Challenge, an annual partnership with the Wichita Public Library that encourages adults to read more broadly.
When not reporting or writing, Suzanne enjoys cooking and traveling with her husband, Andy, playing fetch with their Labrador retrievers, Zeke and Raina, and snuggling with her cat, the Marvelous Mrs. Maisel.
Suzanne has been honored with a National Edward R. Murrow Award for hard news for her story about social-emotional learning in schools: Research shows social-emotional learning in schools pays off, but conservatives see a liberal agenda. She won a national Society of Professional Journalists award for 3,000 Kansas kindergartners and untold preschoolers skipped last year. Now they’re behind, and a national Public Media Journalists Association award for Derby residents pack school board meeting to support principal’s lesson on ‘white privilege’. She has also won numerous Kansas Association of Broadcasters awards for her education coverage.
Suzanne can be reached by email at perez@kmuw.org.
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Despite some truly dark subject matter, "The Road to Tender Hearts" grabs your heart with both hands and somehow gets you laughing through tears. -
Library officials say the library is shifting toward digital resources. It has been weeding out materials that are outdated or available in other formats, or ones that have not been checked out in over a decade. -
Out of 157,000 students who participated in Poetry Out Loud this school year, Wichita East High senior Ismail Saeed is one of 55 who advanced to the national finals in Washington, D.C. The winner gets $20,000. -
'Ordinary Time: Lessons Learned While Staying Put' is a memoir in essays by Annie B. Jones, the owner of an independent bookstore in Thomasville, Georgia. It explores small-town living and the idea that you don't have to do big things in a big city to have a meaningful life. -
As kindergarten becomes more academically intense, some schools in Wichita are incorporating self-directed free play — known among educators as purposeful play — into the daily schedule as a way to enhance learning and teach social skills. -
Katie Kitamura's newest novel, “Audition,” is a slow-burn psychological thriller that you can’t stop reading, even though you’re not exactly sure what’s going on. -
Wichita school board members want an online dashboard where residents can easily track major capital projects. They hope to clarify the district's overall building needs, which were at issue during a recent failed bond campaign. -
Lynn Steger Strong's new novel, "The Float Test," is the story of four siblings who come together in Florida after the unexpected death of their mother. -
In her new book, "Secrets of Adulthood: Simple Truths for Our Complex Lives," author Gretchen Rubin distills decades of research into a collection of easy-to-remember life hacks. -
Left on Read, a new bookstore in downtown Wichita, specializes in books by and about people of color. Owner Latasha Eley Kelly said she is planning author events, book clubs and other activities over the next year.
