Repeated abuses, overlooked complaints and a surge in suicide attempts at a detention center with powerful allies.
This series offers an up-close view of the devastating and enduring impact of gun violence on children's lives.
Journalist Connie Walker's quest to better understand her father and find the priest who abused him in a Canadian residential school leads to one of the most comprehensive investigations to date into a single school.
Judges praised "They Were Sons" for painting “a full picture of the men who died and what it means to lose them,” and for showing the reader the “human shaped holes in the lives of their mothers.” They called the “powerful, first-person storytelling” “unfiltered and unvarnished,” and praised its ability to “capture pride and pain at the same time,” providing a “sense of all that lingers for families after the headlines and social media outrage passes.” They applauded Rita Omokha's “self-effacement and courage,” calling her work “a profound exercise of journalistic responsibility” and “an act of refusal of the easy reporting path.” Originally published by Vanity Fair on May 6, 2021.
Judges called this episode “a masterpiece of trauma-informed journalism” that “cuts right to the heart,” helping listeners “understand the real impact of violence directed at this profession and at the democratic institution.” They praised the team’s “persistent, careful and caring touch” alongside its “straightforward, unblinking approach,” “from the reporting to the language choices to the structure to the ways it demystifies local news.” They praised the team for “creating space for the staff to have agency and nuance in the telling of their own stories,” and said, quite simply, “this story is what trauma is all about.” Originally aired as the first episode of NPR's Embedded podcast on February 18, 2021.
Judges described this project as “an incredible, daring feat of journalism” which took us “to the heart of a huge policy issue,” “uncovering the details of abuse and holding authorities to account.” They praised the team for its “vivid precision of detail” in painting a “full picture” of Candé’s life, “his hopes and dreams” and “who he was outside of the atrocities he endured.” They commended the reporting team for “zeroing in on a governmental entity that can do violence to so many people” – calling the project “heartbreaking and damning for the European Union” – while zooming out to “the climate migration crisis, one of the biggest stories of our time.” Originally published by The Outlaw Ocean Project on November 28th, 2021.
Judges called the coverage of the killing of George Floyd and its aftermath "outstanding" and applauded the team for “helping readers understand that trauma doesn’t end easily or soon, but when addressed properly, it can become a catalyst for major change.” They described the long-form narrative, “George Floyd’s Search for Salvation” as “gripping” and “powerful” “where a symbol and a martyr became a man,” and called it “the definitive George Floyd story.” Originally published by The Star Tribune between May and December, 2020.
This piece tells the story of Wyckoff hospital in Brooklyn at the height of the pandemic, the trauma experienced by healthcare workers, and the impact of fear on medical workers, patients, and other hospital personnel. Judges described “Contagion of Fear” as "deeply insightful” and “profoundly affecting” immersive reporting. They praised Shuster for allowing people to “speak for themselves, free of judgment or editorializing," and called Meridith Kohut’s photographs “revelatory without being overly graphic.” Originally published by TIME in June, 2020.
This investigation and multimedia project examines the Trump administration’s 'Remain in Mexico’ policy and its impacts, including the profound mental health effects on people seeking asylum in the U.S. Judges described “Trapped in Mexico” as a "staggering reporting feat" that "balances insightful data with expansive visuals and hard-hitting reporting.” Judges commented on the “unique sensitivity” of the video stories, and applauded the “slow pace of the storytelling, which mirrors the slow pace of the subjects' asylum cases.” Originally published by Univision News Digital on November 19, 2020. En Español.
A hard-hitting investigation into residential schools for at-risk children across the state of Montana. Judges commended the “depth of reporting” and “incredible commitment on the part of a small newsroom to revisit a persistent problem concerning the on-going, unrelenting abuse of children despite claims that it had been addressed years earlier." Originally published by the Missoulian between January and November 2019.