The Best American Newspaper Narratives of 2012

Judges’ Profiles

Judges’ Profiles 244 TheBestAmericanNewspaperNarrativesof2012 Figure 1. Top to bottom: Roger Thurow, Maria Carrillo, and Michele Weldon Judges’ Profiles 245 Roger Thurow spent two decades as The Wall Street Journal’s foreign correspondent, based in Europe and Africa. His coverage of global affairs spanned the Cold War, the release of Nelson Mandela, the end of apartheid, the wars in the former Yugoslavia and the humanitarian crises of the first decade of this century—along with 10 Olympic Games. In 2003, he and Journal colleague Scott Kilman wrote a series of stories on famine in Africa that was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in International Reporting. Their reporting on humanitarian and development issues was also honored by the United Nations. Thurow and Kilman are authors of the book, Enough: Why the World’s Poorest Starve in an Age of Plenty. In 2009, they were awarded Action Against Hunger’s Humanitarian Award. They also received the 2009 Harry Chapin Why Hunger book award. In May 2012, Thurow published his second book, The Last Hunger Season: A Year in an African Farm Community on the Brink of Change. In January 2010, Thurow joined The Chicago Council on Global Affairs as senior fellow for global agriculture and food policy. Maria Carrillo is managing editor at The Virginian-Pilot in Norfolk, Virginia, where she remains committed to craft even in a Twitter world. Her exceptional writers have been nationally recognized, including being Pulitzer and ASNE finalists. Carrillo has worked at The Pilot for 16 years, directing many of the paper’s projects and previously overseeing its narrative team. That work has spawned five books so far, with a sixth on the way. Carrillo has been a visiting faculty member for The Poynter Institute and the Nieman program, a lecturer for the National Writers Workshops and the American Press Institute, and a Pulitzer juror four times. Michele Weldon, a journalist and author, is assistant professor emerita in service in journalism at The Medill School, Northwestern University, where she has taught since 1996. She is director of Medill Public Thought Leaders and the Northwestern Public Voices Fellowship for The OpEd Project. She was co-director of TEDxNorthwesternU 2014. Her nonfiction books include I Closed My Eyes, Writing to Save Your Life, and Everyman News: The Changing American Front Page, which won the 246 TheBestAmericanNewspaperNarrativesof2012 National Federation of Press Women nonfiction book award in 2009. She has written columns, news and features for many newspapers, websites, magazines and radio. She has produced lessons for TED Ed and competed in the Moth Story Chicago GrandSlam. A popular public speaker, Weldon has delivered close to 200 keynotes across the country and Canada on issues related to women and the media, and has been a guest on hundreds of radio and television shows in the United States, Europe and Canada including The Oprah Winfrey Show, NBC’s Later Today, ABC Sunday Morning, and BBC-TV. She is a board member of Global Girl Media, a former member of the board of directors of Journalism and Women Symposium and has been a seminar leader with The OpEd Project since 2011. Figure 2. Roy Peter Clark (left) and Mike Wilson (right) Judges’ Profiles 247 Roy Peter Clark has taught writing at the Poynter Institute, a school for journalists in St. Petersburg, Florida, since 1979. He has served Poynter as dean, senior scholar, and vice president and is often described as the most influential writing coach in American journalism. He is the author or editor of 16 books, the most recent of which are Writing Tools, The Glamour of Grammar, and Help! For Writers. He is often quoted in news stories about language, politics, sports and American culture. His work has been featured on NPR, CNN and the Oprah Winfrey Show. He thinks of himself as a garage band legend, often using music in his writing workshops . The New York Times described his book The Glamour of Grammar as "very much a manual for the 21st century." Mike Wilson is the former managing editor of the Tampa Bay Times, responsible for the day-to-day operation of the newspaper and Tampabay.com. Wilson came to the Times in 1995 after 12 years as a writer and editor at the Miami Herald. In his career at the Times, he has worked as a reporter, features editor, assistant managing editor for features...