The Pulitzer Prize and the Quality of American Journalism    [Print This Page] Time: 10:45 a.m.-Noon Date: Thursday, Sept. 11 Place: Fred W. Smith Forum, Reynolds Journalism Institute Pulitzer Prize-winning journalists and editors, with Pulitzer specialists, will discuss the quality of American journalism and how the Pulitzer award relates to it. This important conversation will take place at an historic juncture when journalism is in dynamic transition, and there are questions as to how the new technologies and changes in the industry impact core values. Moderator: Seymour Topping Administrator of The Pulitzer Prizes (1992-2002) Former Managing Editor of The New York Times Seymour Topping, BJ '43, has served as a foreign correspondent, editor, university professor and author in his 56-year career. He served as the administrator of the Pulitzer Prizes from 1992-2002, following a 30-year career with The New York Times as chief correspondent in Moscow and Southeast Asia, foreign editor, deputy managing editor and managing editor. Topping began his journalism career after serving as an infantry officer in the Pacific during World War II. He covered the Chinese Civil War for the Associated Press, followed by AP posts in French Indochina, London and Berlin before joining The Times. Topping is the president of the International Advisory Board of the School of Journalism at Tsinghua University in Beijing, China, the San Paolo Professor Emeritus of International Journalism at Columbia University, the former president of the American Society of Newspaper Editors and the author of four books. He is a recipient of the Missouri Honor Medal for Distinguished Service in Journalism. Discussion Leaders Jacqui Banaszynski Professor and Knight Chair in Journalism Missouri School of Journalism Jacqui Banaszynski holds the Knight Chair in Editing at the Missouri School of Journalism and is on the visiting faculty of The Poynter Institute. She has worked as a reporter and editor for more than 30 years, most recently as associate managing editor of the The Seattle Times. Banaszynski spent 18 years as a beat and enterprise reporter and then worked as a projects editor at newspapers in the Midwest and Pacific Northwest. While at the St. Paul (Minn.) Pioneer Press, her series "AIDS in the Heartland" - an intimate look at the life and death of a gay farm couple - won the 1988 Pulitzer Prize in feature writing and a national Society of Professional Journalists' Distinguished Service Award. Banaszynski's many awards as a reporter and editor include the American Society for Newspaper Editors' Best Feature Writing Award, the Ernie Pyle Award for Human Interest Writing and the Leob Award for economic journalism. She also has served as a Pulitzer juror.   Steve Fainaru Correspondent The Washington Post Steve Fainaru, BJ '84, is a correspondent for The Washington Post's foreign staff. His series on private security contractors in Iraq won the 2008 Pulitzer Prize in international reporting and the Overseas Press Club's Hal Boyle Award for best newspaper or wire-service reporting from abroad. Fainaru was a Pulitzer finalist in 2006 for his articles on the deadly violence faced by ordinary U.S. troops as the insurgency in Iraq intensified. He has worked for The Post since 2000, previously covering the war on terrorism and civil liberties, and serving as an investigative reporter focusing on sports. Previously Fainaru worked 11 years at The Boston Globe and served as the paper's Latin America bureau chief. He is the co-author of The Duke of Havana: Baseball, Cuba and the Search for the American Dream, which chronicled the odyssey of pitcher Orlando "El Duque" Hernandez and his defection from post-Cold War Cuba. Fainaru is working on another book, Big Boy Rules: America's Mercenaries in Iraq, which will be published in fall 2008. He earned his master's degree from the Columbia University School of International and Public Affairs in 1994.   James V. Grimaldi Investigative Reporter The Washington Post James V. Grimaldi, BJ '84, is an investigative reporter for The Washington Post. In 2006, he won the Pulitzer Prize for investigative reporting with two Post reporters for their work on the Jack Abramoff lobbying scandal. The stories also won the Selden Ring Award and the Worth Bingham Prize. In 2007, Grimaldi wrote stories about the Smithsonian that led to the resignation of the top two officials and others at the museum complex. In 2004, Grimaldi worked on a series of stories on major fundraisers in the presidential campaign and in 2003 he co-authored stories on animal deaths at the Smithsonian-run National Zoo that led to the resignation of the zoo's director. Articles he and the Post investigative team reported and wrote after Sept. 11 were part of the Post's entry that was a public-service finalist for the 2002 Pulitzer Prize. Grimaldi won the 2002 Society of American Business Editors and Writers award for breaking news. Previously he has won awards from SPJ, the National Press Club and other media organizations and was a contributor to The Orange County Register staff entry that won the 1996 Pulitzer Prize for investigative reporting. He was a Knight-Bagehot fellow in business and economics journalism and a 2007 Ferris Professor of Journalism at Princeton University.   Roy J. Harris Jr. Author Pulitzer's Gold: Behind the Prize for Public Service Journalism Roy Harris, most recently a senior editor with The Economist Group's Boston-based CFO magazine, had Pulitzer's Gold published by the University of Missouri Press in early 2008. Of his 40 years in the media, 23 years were spent as a reporter and editor for The Wall Street Journal, where he also served as deputy chief of its 14-member Los Angeles bureau. In that role, he helped coordinate coverage of such stories as the 1992 race rioting that followed the police beating of Rodney King and the devastating 1994 Northridge earthquake. While at CFO, he served as national president of the American Society of Business Publication Editors, taught journalism at Emerson College and contributed articles on the Pulitzer Prizes to the Poynter Institute. He is the son of a Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, which won five public service Pulitzers in a 15-year period.   Jeff Leen Investigative Unit Reporter and Editor The Washington Post Jeff Leen, MA '82, is a reporter and editor in The Washington Post's investigative unit, where he was part of a four-reporter team whose investigation of Washington, D.C., police shootings won the 1999 Pulitzer gold medal, the paper's first since Watergate. As The Post's investigations editor and later assistant managing editor in charge of investigations, Leen has directed reporters investigating deaths among the mentally retarded and at-risk children, plutonium poisoning in Kentucky, overseas drug testing, the Sept. 11 terror attacks, the business activities of the Nature Conservancy, the Jack Abramoff lobbying scandal and federal farm subsidy abuse. The work has been honored with four Pulitzer Prizes, including another Gold Medal and two for investigative reporting. Previously he worked on the investigative team for the Miami Herald, where he co-authored a 10-part series on the Medellin Cartel that was later turned into a book, Kings of Cocaine: A True Story of Murder, Money and International Corruption. At the Herald, he also contributed to the coverage of Hurricane Andrew that was awarded the Pulitzer Prize gold medal for public service in 1993.   Mike McGraw Special Projects Reporter The Kansas City Star Mike McGraw, BJ '71, MA '72, is a Pulitzer-Prize winning special projects desk reporter for The Kansas City Star. He also has worked at The Hartford Courant and The Des Moines Register. He began his reporting career in 1972 after graduating from the Missouri School of Journalism. McGraw has covered a wide range of issues in depth, including organized labor, meatpacking, the federal judiciary, NASA, occupational safety and health issues, building collapses, food safety, housing issues and art world fraud. He is a former member of the board of Investigative Reporters and Editors and a contributor to IRE's The Reporter's Handbook. McGraw has taught investigative reporting at the Missouri School of Journalism and the University of Kansas. His awards include the 1992 Pulitzer Prize for national reporting, with Jeff Taylor, for their critical investigation of the U.S. Department of Agriculture, in addition to two George Polk awards.   James B. Steele Contributing Editor VANITY FAIR James B. Steele is a contributing editor for VANITY FAIR. He and his reporting colleague, Donald L. Barlett, comprise the longest running and one of the best known investigative reporting teams in American journalism. They have worked together for more than three decades, first at The Philadelphia Inquirer, then at TIME magazine and now at VANITY FAIR. Recipients of virtually every major national journalism award including two Pulitzer Prizes in national reporting, the Missouri Honor Medal for Distinguished Service in Journalism and two National Magazine Awards, Barlett and Steele have explored a wide range of topics from health care to the influence of money in politics. They are the authors of seven books, including The New York Times best-seller America: What Went Wrong? A Kansas native, Steele grew up in Kansas City, Mo., and is a graduate of the University of Missouri-Kansas City. He began his journalism career at The Kansas City Times. About the Futures Forum Top journalists, advertisers and thought leaders will lead numerous interactive sessions during the Sept. 11 Futures Forum, a day of cutting-edge discussions about the next century of journalism. Ethics, convergence and politics are just a few of the many hot topics that will be explored in this diverse program dedicated to challenging industry thinking and visualizing possibilities for the future. Sessions will be 75 minutes long and held concurrently with others on the schedule. Full schedules will be available during on-site check in during the Sept. 10-12 celebration. Close Window