More about me:
Sara Moniuszko is a Wellness and Lifestyle reporter at USA TODAY whose work focuses on the intersection of culture and mental health. She pitches, researches and writes stories on a weekly basis that cover a wide range of topics, exploring everything from stigma against LGBTQ patients in healthcare settings to the societal ramifications of gendered violence to the latest problematic TikTok trend.
Moniuszko has unpacked COVID shame, analyzed period stigma and written explainers on trauma. Her work also features high-profile celebrity interviews – she has spoken with Michael Phelps on his struggles with depression and suicidal thoughts and interviewed Lady Gaga on the near universal feeling of powerlessness during the pandemic. Other celebrity interviews include Jennifer Aniston, Ciara, Ryan Seacrest and more. She also has experience interviewing a diverse group of health professionals and other experts.
Moniuszko also authors a weekly newsletter on mental health that now has 20,000 subscribers. As a member of the LGBTQ community, Moniuszko has intimate knowledge of and an informed perspective on the intersections of diversity and mental health. She is intentional about including diverse voices in her reporting and is committed to deepening readers’ understanding of underreported communities.
Before she was selected to join USA TODAY’s recently launched Wellness vertical, she wrote breaking and trending news as a digital editor for the newspaper's Life, Entertainment and Travel sections. In this role, she also did event coverage including New York Fashion Week and the White House Correspondents' Dinner.
Moniuszko graduated summa cum laude in 2017 from George Mason University outside of Washington, D.C. with a double major in Communication (with a concentration in Journalism) and French.
Moniuszko studied for a semester abroad at SciencesPo, a political science institute in Paris, France, where she deepened her global perspective and sharpened her French speaking skills. Thanks to an internship with USA TODAY, she was able to extend her stay in France to write news and feature articles as a correspondent.
Before USA TODAY, Moniuszko interned at NBC Washington as a part of their digital news team. There she wrote local news and lifestyle stories, cut and uploaded videos from the broadcast to the website and helped cover the 2016 presidential election. (More recently, she helped cover the 2020 presidential inauguration.)
Other experiences include working for Mason's student-run newspaper, Fourth Estate, starting as a staff writer freshman year before working through multiple editor positions until becoming the Editor-in-Chief of the entire publication in fall 2015. In addition to editing stories, generating ideas, managing a team of editors and ensuring timely content production, Moniuszko also found time to take on stories herself. She’s particularly proud of a feature piece she did on transgender students at the time.
On top of her work with Fourth Estate, she also held a position as a daily news anchor with the Mason Cable Network, where she worked as on-camera talent for the Mason Cable News daily updates every Thursday morning. In this role, she also wrote scripts, set up camera equipment and edited video.