WABE Receives Numerous Prestigious Awards For Journalistic Excellence In 2019

Maegan Smith • Jul 3, 2019

WABE, Atlanta’s NPR station, has been awarded numerous industry-leading awards in 2019, honoring its reporting, storytelling and journalistic excellence.

WABE won the Pacemaker award at the Georgia Associated Press Media Editors Awards.

2018 Georgia Associated Press Media Editors Awards and Pacemaker Award (Awarded in June 2019)

WABE was the top radio winner in the Georgia Associated Press Media Editors Awards and received the Pacemaker Award for this distinction. WABE won five first-place awards, including best newscast, and three second-place awards. Specific stories include:

First place for Investigative reporting by Jim Burress on Google Fiber’s failed promises in Atlanta.
Top honors to Environment reporter Molly Samuel for Best Use of Sound with her exploration of noisy sea creatures at Georgia’s Gray’s Reef.
First place to reporter Stephannie Stokes in Best Specialized Reporting for her story on Atlanta’s housing history told through one vacant and dilapidated home.
Top honors for Politics reporter Johnny Kauffman in Series reporting for coverage of Georgia’s “use it or lose it” voter purges.
Second place to Criminal Justice reporter Lisa Hagen in Specialized Reporting for her story on Atlanta ending cash bail.
Second place to Education reporter Martha Dalton won second place for her series “Lost in the Shuffle: Student Turnover in the Era of Grading Schools”
Health reporter Elly Yu’s documentary “Overwhelmed in the ER: Georgia’s Mental Health Crisis” won first place not just in the Georgia Associated Press Awards, but also in the national Public Radio News Directors’ competition.

Green Eyeshade Awards

Presented by the Society of Professional Journalists, the Green Eyeshade Awards recognize journalistic excellence in 11 Southern states. WABE was presented with four Green Eyeshade Awards:

Specific stories include:

Feature Reporting First Place: Molly Samuel, Sea Level Rise in Georgia
Feature Reporting Second Place: WABE Radio – Stephannie Stokes, 3 PM Eviction Hearing
Documentary Second Place: WABE Radio – Johnny Kauffman & Angela Caputo, Who Gets To Vote?
Investigative Reporting Third Place: WABE Radio – Jim Burress, The Big Disconnect: What Happened to Google Fiber in Atlanta

AWARDS FOR BURIED TRUTHS PODCAST

Peabody Award – Radio/Podcast

Season one of WABE’s powerful podcast, Buried Truths, was awarded a prestigious Peabody Award in the radio/podcast category. The Peabody winners represent the most compelling and empowering stories released in broadcasting and digital media during the past year. The 30 winners were selected by a jury of media luminaries from more than 1,200 entries.

Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights Journalist Award for Radio

The first season of Buried Truths was recently awarded the Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights Journalism Award. The Awards honor outstanding reporting on issues that reflect Robert Kennedy’s concerns, including human rights, social justice, and the power of individual action in the United States and around the world.

Webby Award

Season one of Buried Truths was named an Honoree in the Crime and Justice category of the Webby Awards. The Webby Awards are the leading international award honoring excellence on the internet.

Buried Truths, a podcast from WABE hosted by Pulitzer-Prize-winning journalist and educator Hank Klibanoff, acknowledges and unearths still-relevant stories of injustice, resilience and racism in the American South. The podcast uses investigative journalism to honor lives and reveals what’s been hidden, not published and not taught. Season 1 and season 2 of Buried Truths can be found here: www.wabe.org/buriedtruths.