Houston Christian Alum Ellie Ashby '20, Earns Prestigious Journalism Fellowship at Religion News Service and Texas Tribune

Houston Christian High School proudly celebrates alum Ellie Ashby '20, on being selected for a prestigious journalism fellowship jointly hosted by Religion News Service and the Texas Tribune. This fall, Ellie will cover religion and public life in Texas during a pivotal election cycle — a role that reflects years of dedicated scholarship, a gift for storytelling, and a deep commitment to helping others understand the role of faith in everyday life.

Raised in Houston as the daughter of a pastor, Ellie's roots in faith and community shaped the questions she would carry with her long after leaving Houston Christian's halls. After graduating in 2020, she went on to Harvard College, where she studied Social Studies — an interdisciplinary concentration combining history, sociology, anthropology, and economics — and wrote about religion and campus life for the Harvard Crimson. It was there that a single course on religion and American history changed the course of her academic journey.

"I found that so many of the theoretical questions I had been building found an even deeper home within the lens of religion," Ellie said.

That realization led her to Harvard Divinity School, where she earned a Master of Theological Studies with a focus on American evangelicalism, scripture, pluralism, and public religion. Her graduate research explored how evangelical Christians interpret and embody their faith in everyday life — not just as a political phenomenon, but as something deeply personal and meaningful. Along the way, she co-founded a campus writing community, led a student literary journal as editor-in-chief, and collaborated with Harvard's Pluralism Project.

Through it all, one question has remained at the center of her work: How do people live what they claim to believe?

Now, through journalism, she is bringing that question to a wider audience. "I don't think this work should exist independently from the public," Ellie said. "I want to understand how real people integrate faith into their lives and help tell those stories."

Houston Christian celebrates Ellie's achievement as a reflection of her character, her curiosity, and the foundation she built here. We look forward to following her bylines and watching her make an impact on one of the most important conversations in public life today.