
Amber Ferguson didnโt study journalism, but she always knew she wanted to write. This is ironic since, as a young girl she lagged behind in her elementary reading levels. Over time her teachers closely tracked her comprehension, and one day while completing a free writing assignment, Ferguson wrote a simple sentence: I like cats. By the end of the year she was able to write two full pages. This was one of the earliest glimmers she saw in recognizing the power of her words, and she hasnโt taken that for granted since.
Now Ferguson is a video editor and general assignment reporter for the Washington Post, one of the countryโs most respected publications. Funnily enough, she didnโt even think she would become a journalistโshe just wanted to write.
โI think I recognized early on how much storytelling moves the world, but I really didnโt see myself in journalism,โ Ferguson tells ESSENCE.
Fortunately, the universe saw differently and led her on a path to work for major outlets including NBC News, CNN and the Huffington Post before joining the Post in 2017. Although her resume is filled with impressive roles, make no mistake, Ferguson paid her dues.
โWhen I moved to The Washington Post, it was a journey because I went from very new media, having worked as a video editor with HuffPost, to traditional media; it threw me for a loop,โ she explains to ESSENCE. โI was working overnights from 9:00 PM to 5:00 AM for two years, and I was the only video editor overnights. Then on the side, I was writing stories. Honestly I was working from 9:00a to 9:00p, but through that I just created this muscle of being able to integrate both video and writing, and very few people do that.โ
Through her work sheโs been able to put together engrossing multimedia stories using text, video and photo to drive the stories she believes in. A majority of the most impactful of those stories center Black women, a welcome change among legacy media outlets that often overlook minority narratives.
One standout story sheds light on a pervasive issue that is rarely spoken about, Black male sperm shortages. Ferguson tackled the topic in 2022, but was inspired long before by her cousinโs fertility journey.
โIn 2019 my cousin was in her mid-40s and sheโs super accomplished professionally,โ Ferguson says. โShe was single, and she told me she couldnโt find a Black sperm donor. I thought she was being picky. But during the pandemic, I was on TikTok, and I saw a lesbian woman holding a biracial baby that was hers. People were just really vile in the comments asking her why she would choose to have a biracial baby? She said, Thereโs no Black sperm donors.โ
Ferguson said that statement resonated with her because her cousin echoed the same sentiment. That revelation took her down a research journey where Ferguson found out that fewer than 2% of US sperm donors are Black.
โWhat does that mean for a Black woman? I didnโt want to do a piece that was just focused on statistics. I wanted to show the real journeys of these women because it means that you either have to have a biracial baby when you didnโt really want that, or you choose to go through a dangerous method to have a baby.โ
She interviewed a dozen Black women who tried to find a Black sperm donor and couldnโt. Ferguson even ensured her story held sperm banks accountable and asked the tough questions for what seemed like the first time. Why do you have such few Black men donating?
โItโs a whole unknown world out there and it opened me up into this fertility space because the myth is that for Black women, itโs so easy to have a baby, but itโs not. We know about maternal mortality, but we donโt know about that other side of how challenging it can be to have the Black child you desire. This story really allowed me to start really centering Black women in my reporting.โ
Those stories include an in-depth report on the true brand-building impact of ESSENCE Festival of Culture, Black womenโs failed abortions and even Black women using Botox to save their edges.
Why is this kind of niche storytelling so important to her when she works for one of the most wide-reaching outlets in the world? Simple putโbecause she can.
โMy team really believes in my ideas and encourages me to pursue them, which is rare in journalism nowadays because these news outlets are businesses at the end of the day, and they need to make money, not just tell the stories they want to tell,โ Ferguson says. โI tell these types of stories because they matter. Some editorial cuts are always going to be made, but I will fight for certain things because I know a Black woman can relate to them. That just doesnโt happen enough, and I recognize the power in changing that. โ