✨ Best of 2025 ✨
Our favorite stories, music performances, and podcasts that WNIJ produced this year
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News Stories
WNIJ's reporters picked a few of their favorite stories they worked on this year
Jess Savage - environment reporter
I was eager to go out and visit local barns and meet some farmers in our community, who generously opened their spaces for us. Creating an audio postcard added a creative challenge to the reporting! - Jess
Nachusa Grasslands is one of my favorite spots in our listening area. The vast prairie in the fall, when so many plants are drying out and turning brown, was just as beautiful as in early summer when everything’s in bloom. - Jess
This was a fun one. I had always heard about the lake effect, but it was great to actually sit down with a meteorologist — and friend of the station — to break down this regional phenomenon. - Jess
This was such a fun one too! I was so excited to meet a young person who was out in her local natural areas, trying to make the space better for everyone. - Jess
Yvonne Boose - arts & culture reporter
A 9-year-old Sycamore boy spreads positivity with a compliment stand, earning national attention for his acts of kindness.
How theater helps seniors find joy in the spotlight and combat social isolation through the power of performance.
Peter Medlin - education reporter
The AI "Harriet Tubman" voice at the beginning is genuinely unsettling -- you've gotta listen to it if you haven't. With this, I wanted to look into how teachers were actually using AI and how much schools were spending on it. - Peter
This is a great example of the investigative work we do at WNIJ. I spent months talking with sources, filing records requests, & building a timeline of events so we could best show how school administrators made choices that left students without the support they need. - Peter
Jason Cregier - Morning Edition host
When comedian, podcast host and actor Gareth Reynolds came to Batavia, he talked with Jason about improvising on stage and the best listener calls he's gotten on his podcast "We're Here to Help" with actor Jake Johnson.
If you’ve flipped on sports radio in Illinois at some point over the years, chances are you’ve heard the voice of Dan Bernstein. He was a longtime host at Chicago’s sports radio station 670 The Score, until he was fired from the station in March. Now, Bernstein has returned to the sports talk scene with a series of podcasts. He talked with Jason about his decades on air and recent digital pivot.
If you have watched a tv weather forecast out of the Rockford market in the last twenty years, there is a good chance Mark Henderson delivered it. Henderson was the chief meteorologist for WIFR TV for 22 years, until he was let go from that role this past May.
He talked with Jason about his new venture: Mark Henderson’s Weather Hub on Facebook and YouTube.
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Music performances
Some of our favorite music showacases from WNIJ's Studio A
A fusion of jazz, hip hop, and electronic music with trombonist Artie Do Good performing from his album "SOCIALIST DANCE PARTY."
Star Wars meets psychedelic rock as Rishi Maze transforms Studio A into outer space with immersive visuals and sound.
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Podcasts
Some of WNIJ's best podcast episodes of the year
Teachers' Lounge
Vienna superintendent Joshua Stafford is so passionate and such a compelling storyteller. Come for the in-depth education analysis, stay for the story of the trip to Haiti that changed his life. - Peter
You'll listen to West Aurora High School physics teacher Julie Zaborac for 30 seconds and think 'Wow, I would have been a physicist if I'd had her in high school!' - Peter
I love this episode, because it highlights the clubs and activities that are often the reasons why students want to come to school. We've got the story of a rural high school FFA club and a group of students putting on their school's first play in over a decade. It was the best! - Peter
Under Rocks
In a quiet wooded neighborhood on the south side of Rockford, there’s a man making magic in his basement workshop. Tom Asher uses the tools, knowledge, and creative skills he’s gathered over a lifetime as a musician, woodworker, and artist -- to craft violins.
Does Illinois really need a new flag? Or is the old "seal on a bedsheet" good enough? We call on our favorite expert, self-proclaimed state symbologist and Illinois Enthusiast John Kokoris to review the options the state's flag commission is offering. And he is, respectfully, not pleased.
Poetically Yours
This episode's featured poet is Richard Vargas. He moved to Rockford in 1995 but now lives in Wisconsin. His latest book “The Screw City Poems,” recounts some of his experiences in Rockford. This poem, “It’s a Living” is a part of that collection.
This poem is by Carol Alfus. She’s a retired teacher, community volunteer, enthusiastic traveler and gardener. Her poetry is informed and inspired by current events, personal memories and the boundless beauty and ingenuity of the natural world. Her first poetry chapbook, I Would Swim in Such a Sky, will be published by Kelsay Books in early 2026. Here’s her poem “Be careful what you ask for: a true story.”
This episode’s poet is Auburn High School’s LIT UP group member, Safiya Brooks.
This group participates in an Open Mic at the Certified Open Mic and Poetry Slam at the Rockford Public Library Nordlof Center. Here’s group member Safiya Brooks’ poem “This Month’s Rent Paid Only in Dimes.”
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Perspectives
WNIJ's Susan Stephens is the editor of our "Perspectives" series, where listeners submit short commentaries. Here are some of her favorites of 2025
Listener commentaries
Suzanne Degges-White celebrates (?) the joys of dog ownership.
How did Marnie O. Mamminga's reunion with friends of a different political persuasion go?
Lindsay Curtis was a student in Jason Akst's Spring '25 Journalism 401 class at Northern Illinois University. You can find more student essays at https://www.northernpublicradio.org/tags/j401
Dan Libman says to challenge yourself, no matter how bad it feels at first.
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Community Corps stories
WNIJ Community Corps are volunteer correspondents assisting the newsroom in monitoring area headlines and press releases, and writing general assignment newscast copy under the supervision of WNIJ’s editorial team
Stories from our volunteer correspondents
The Gail Borden Public Library has received a state grant to digitize documents such as “The Elgin Dairy Report.”
The restoration of Beyer Stadium at Maybelle Blair Park is the next phase of a six-acre global campus in Rockford.
Avian researchers at the University of Illinois are working to uncover the full annual cycle of the bird.
Their old organ had been in service for more than two decades. When it became clear that the time had come to get a new organ, which didn’t come cheap, the decision among the congregation was nearly unanimous. A new organ meant hope for the future.
