MedPage Today, Mountain State Spotlight and The California Divide collaboration hosted at CalMatters have each won a Poverty and Inequality Award from the National Press Foundation for reporting on what works to alleviate poverty in the United States.
Their work highlighted how longstanding problems with foster care, child hunger and eviction have been exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic – and what can be done about it.
Elizabeth Hlavinka and Shannon Firth of MedPage Today won for their piece, “COVID-19 Strips Safety Net for Foster Youth ‘Aging Out’ During Pandemic,” a devastating look at how underserved youth outgrow the foster care system only to face hunger, homelessness and loneliness.
The judges said the story spotlighted a facet of poverty that few people know exists, and exposed multiple systemic failures that, if left unchecked, will perpetuate poverty.
“Foster kids are already at a disadvantage in life, and during the pandemic they are aging out of the system with no safety net or preparation for life on their own,” noted judge Sandy K. Johnson, President Emeritus of the National Press Foundation.
Hlvanika and Firth won for best work by any sized news outlet.
Mountain State Spotlight’s Amelia Ferrell Knisely won the award for best reporting from a small newsroom for her story, “School’s back, but hunger persists. West Virginia still struggles to feed its neediest kids, especially remote learners.” Knisely is also a Report for America corps member.
While 10% of children in West Virginia are food insecure, Knisely showed that there are haves and have-nots even in poverty, the judges noted. In one county, the school system was paying bus drivers to deliver food to children learning remotely, while in a different county, 100% of kids qualified for free meals but did not get them delivered.
Judges praised the piece not only for illustrating the critical role public school systems play in alleviating poverty, but also for reporting on solutions.
“This is compelling journalism that highlights what is working,” said judge Krissah Thompson, The Washington Post’s Managing Editor of Diversity and Inclusion.
The California Divide collaboration among teams from CalMatters, The Mercury News in San Jose and The Salinas Californian won for an ongoing project to track what is happening to vulnerable California renters as the U.S. eviction crisis worsens.
“Staying Sheltered,” a dynamic, multimedia report by Nigel Duara, Orlando Mayorquin and Jackie Botts of CalMatters and a Report for America corps member, Laurence Du Sault of The Mercury News and also a Report for America corps member, and Kate Cimini of The Salinas Californian, highlighted not only the struggles but also the resourcefulness of renters throughout the Golden State. The collaboration is hosted at CalMatters.
“Its stories don’t just focus on the problems, but on the solutions renters have devised to keep a roof over their heads,” noted judge Tony Marcano, managing editor of KPCC Southern California public radio.
The work “underscores the disproportionate impact of the pandemic on renters, who were getting by before the global health emergency put them in a jeopardy of losing their homes,” Thompson said. “The human stories take the reader beyond the policy debates and the project smartly incorporates news updates, which follow the California government’s response to the crisis.”
These are the second round of NPF awards honoring journalism about poverty and inequality. The first awards, announced in December 2020, were won by Idrees Kahloon of The Economist, for a story on how to measure poverty and Anna Wolfe of Mississippi Today for a piece on how the schoolchildren of Jackson were coping with the unprecedented challenges of COVID-19. A third round of prizes will be awarded later in 2021. Each award carried a $4,000 cash prize.
The Poverty and Inequality Awards are being offered in conjunction with ongoing online trainings for journalists. All of the resources from those trainings can be found here. Both the awards and the trainings are funded by the David and Lucile Packard Foundation, W.K. Kellogg Foundation and Heising-Simons Foundation; NPF is solely responsible for the content.
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