The New England Newspaper & Press Association on Thursday and Friday awarded 11 journalism prizes to Worcester Business Journal, honoring the publication for a range of coverage including economic, diversity, coronavirus, design & opinion pieces.
WBJ News Editor Grant Welker, who won six awards overall, received a first place prize in the General News category for his “Worcester’s economy is catching up” story looking at dozens of economic indicators comparing Worcester’s recovery to similarly sized metro areas.
In the Racial & Ethnic Reporting category, Welker won second place for his “Black businesses matter” story, examining how the lack of support for black-owned businesses in Worcester County led to economic and social disparities. This marks the second year in a row WBJ has been honored in the Racial & Ethnic Reporting category, after former staff writer Zachary Comeau won last year for his “Left behind” feature on how people of color were struggling to gain a foothold in the marijuana industry.
WBJ Columnist Bonnie J. Walker won third place in the Serious Columnist category for her “Outside the Box” columns focusing on diversity & inclusion issues.
“We strive to bring informative and thought-provoking coverage to our readers every single day. To win 11 awards from a highly respected organization like NENPA for such a broad range of coverage provides a nice affirmation of that hard work,” said WBJ Editor Brad Kane.
WBJ Art Director Mitchell Hayes won first place in the Overall Design & Presentation of Niche Publication category for his work on the 20th anniversary of the 40 Under Forty edition in 2019. The contest year covers Aug. 1, 2019 to July 31, 2020. This is the second time in three years Hayes has been honored by NENPA for his design of the 40 Under Forty edition, which is an annual publication and awards from WBJ.
Freelance editorial cartoonist Don Landgren won first place in the Editorial Cartoon category, for his opinion piece about the opioid crisis. Landgren was competing against all other publications in New England in this category, as opposed to most of the other categories where WBJ competes either against niche publications or weekly newspapers. This is the second year in a row Landgren has placed in this category.
Of the 11 awards WBJ won, which is its highest number ever for the NENPA contest, the other six were:
- Second place in the Best Podcast category, for the WBJ Weekly Business Report, which WBJ Editor Brad Kane produces along with Hank Stolz of Radio Worcester
- Second place in the Education Reporting category, to Welker for his “Boom times for Central Mass. college endowments” story
- Third place in the Editorial Writing category, to Kane and WBJ Publisher Peter Stanton for their editorial opinion pieces
- Third place in the Best Coverage of the Coronavirus category, to Welker for his “Needed: Hospital beds” story about the expected shortage in spring 2020 of hospital beds for COVID-19 patients
- Third place in the Health Reporting category, to Welker for his “Cutting at the top” story about cuts in executive pay at Central Massachusetts hospitals
- Third place in the Science & Technology category, to Welker for his “NIH billions” story about the National Institutes of Health research funding Central Massachusetts organizations receive.
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