2020 Category Finalists & Winners of the National Awards for Education Reporting
EWA is pleased to announce the 2020 winners along with the finalists.
Audio Storytelling
Smaller Newsroom
Black at Mizzou: Confronting Race on Campus
Lauren Brown, Sabby Robinson, Chris Julin, Catherine Winter and Alex Baumhardt
APM Reports
FINALISTS
Covid on Campus
Sasha Aslanian, Stephen Smith and Catherine Winter
APM Reports
WFPL Series on Student Assignment and Segregation in Louisville
Jess Clark
WFPL Louisville Public Media
Larger newsroom
Two Schools in Marin County
Marianne McCune, Kai Wright, Christopher Werth and Karen Frillmann
WNYC Studios
FINALISTS
NPR’s 2020 College Road Trip
Elissa Nadworny and Lauren Migaki
NPR
Starting College Behind
Kate McGee and Kate Grossman
WBEZ Chicago
Beat Reporting
Small newsroom
Jon Marcus on the Higher Education Beat
Jon Marcus
The Hechinger Report
FINALISTS
Education in Minnesota’s Immigrant and Refugee Communities
Becky Z. Dernbach
Sahan Journal
Student Wellness and Special Education
Carolyn Jones
EdSource
Midsize newsroom
Investigating the Impact of Coronavirus on Texas’ Public Schools
Aliyya Swaby
The Texas Tribune
FINALISTS
Indiana Beat Reporting
Stephanie Wang
Chalkbeat
Ricardo Cano’s Beat Reporting
Ricardo Cano
CalMatters
Large newsroom
Bianca Vázquez Toness
Bianca Vázquez Toness
The Boston Globe
FINALISTS
Dana Goldstein, K-12 Schools
Dana Goldstein
The New York Times
Laura Meckler
Laura Meckler
The Washington Post
Features
Small newsroom
Inside a Preschool That Treats the Youngest Victims of the Opioid Crisis
Emily Tate
EdSurge
FINALISTS
A Border School for Asylum Seekers Goes Virtual
Jo Napolitano
The 74
The Long Digital Divide: How Four Presidential Administrations Failed to Fix Internet Inequality Prior to the Pandemic
Kevin Mahnken
The 74
Midsize newsroom
‘It’s Creating a New Normal’: A Navajo School District and Its Students Fight to Overcome Amid COVID-19
Anthony J. Wallace and Megan Marples
Cronkite News at Arizona State University
FINALISTS
The Broken Promise of Alexander v. Holmes
Bracey Harris
The Hechinger Report
Traveling to the African Diaspora to Prepare Black Students for College
Casey Parks
The Hechinger Report
Large newsroom
The Children in the Shadows
Samantha Shapiro
The New York Times
FINALISTS
Climate Change: Are We Ready?
Caroline Preston and Pete D’Amato
The Hechinger Report
Rebecca Klein
HuffPost
The Test of Their Lives
Laura Meckler
The Washington Post
Investigative Reporting
Smaller newsroom
Separated By Design
Jacqueline Rabe Thomas
The Connecticut Mirror
FINALISTS
DeVos on the Docket: An Investigation of America’s Most-Sued Education Secretary
Linda Jacobson
The 74
School Abuse
Ann Dornfeld, Liz Jones and Isolde Raftery
KUOW News
Larger newsroom
JCPS Pulls Troubled Kids From Schools, Outraging Parents
Mandy McLaren
The Courier Journal
FINALISTS
At College Health Centers, Students Battle Misdiagnoses and Inaccessible Care
Jenn Abelson, Nicole Dungca, Meryl Kornfield and Andrew Ban Tran
The Washington Post
Targeted
Kathleen McGrory and Neil Bedi
Tampa Bay Times
News
Small newsroom
A ‘Drastic Experiment’: Coronavirus and the Future of American Schooling
Barbara Kantrowitz, Jackie Mader, Lillian Mongeau and Caroline Preston
The Hechinger Report
FINALISTS
Ed-Tech Companies Promise Results, But Their Claims Are Often Based on Shoddy Research
Sarah Butrymowicz, Tara Garcia Mathewson
The Hechinger Report
Higher Ed’s Coronavirus Woes: A Deeper Dive
Jon Marcus, Meredith Kolodner and Sarah Butrymowicz
The Hechinger Report
Midsize newsroom
Guidance From DeVos Means More Coronavirus Relief for Private Schools
Matt Barnum
Chalkbeat
FINALISTS
Michael Vasquez: Georgia Universities’ Covid Crisis
Michael Vasquez
The Chronicle of Higher Education
The Nation’s Largest School System Goes All-Remote as New York City Becomes the Epicenter of the Coronavirus
Alex Zimmerman, Christina Veiga and Reema Amin
Chalkbeat
Large newsroom
Fairfax County Schools
Hannah Natanson
The Washington Post
FINALISTS
The Pandemic and Illinois Schools: A Digital Divide, Vulnerable Students and Hidden Data
Jodi S. Cohen and Jennifer Smith Richards
Chicago Tribune
Haru Coryne
ProPublica Illinois
Trump’s Words, Bullied Kids, Scarred Schools
John Woodrow Cox, Hannah Natanson and Perry Stein
The Washington Post
Public Service
Smaller newsroom
Why Don’t We Know Podcast: Education Records
Sara Ganim, Tori Whidden, Camille Respess, Amy Fu, James Sullivan, Daniel Townsend, Gabriella Paul, Marianna Faiello and Frank LoMonte
The Brechner Center for Freedom of Information at the University of Florida
FINALISTS
Demystifying Chicago’s Local School Councils
Staff
Chalkbeat Chicago, Block Club Chicago, DataMade
Reading Curriculum in Colorado Schools
Ann Schimke
Chalkbeat
Larger newsroom
Racism at the Virginia Military Institute
Ian Shapira
The Washington Post
FINALISTS
Equity in Boston’s High School Admissions
Meghan E. Irons, Bianca Vázquez Toness, Malcolm Gay and Sarah Carr
The Boston Globe
Tracking the Coronavirus at Colleges
The Staff of The New York Times
The New York Times
Visual Storytelling
Smaller newsroom
Becoming the Conductor
Robert Kinlaw
EducationNC
FINALISTS
Making It Work: A Day in the Life of Families Living Through a Summer Like No Other
Emmeline Zhao, JoAnne Wasserman, Taylor Swaak, Patrick O’Donnell, Bekah McNeel and Jim Fields
The 74
Strength in Rural Places: Anchored in Hayesville
Caroline Parker, Taylor Shain and Robert Kinlaw
EducationNC
Larger newsroom
Just for Kids: A Coronavirus Comic
Malaka Gharib and Cory Turner
NPR
FINALISTS
NBC Nightly News: Kids Edition
Staff of NBC Nightly News
NBC News
What Back to School Might Look Like in the Age of Covid-19
Dana Goldstein, Yuliya Parshina-Kottas and Aliza Aufrichtig
The New York Times
