Wallace House Presents the feature film “She Said,” and a conversation with Jodi Kantor and Megan Twohey

Jodi Kantor and Megan Twohey, Pulitzer Prize-winning New York Times reporters and authors of the book “She Said”

Special Screening of the feature film “She Said,” and conversation with Jodi Kantor and Megan Twohey

Meet Pulitzer Prize-winning journalists behind the Harvey Weinstein exposé

5:30 PM | Monday, Nov. 28, 2022

Michigan Theater

Purchase tickets: Michigan Theater
Free tickets for students: Michigan Theater

This event will not be live-streamed. Wallace House and its co-sponsors will not receive any proceeds from ticket sales.

A special screening and conversation

On October 5, 2017, Jodi Kantor and Megan Twohey of The New York Times broke the story of Harvey Weinstein’s decades of sexual abuse allegations and changed the world. The publication of their investigation spurred the #MeToo movement, with victims voicing allegations of systemic sexual harassment and abuse by hundreds of powerful men across every walk of life and industry.

Meet the reporters behind the groundbreaking expose and watch the feature film, “She Said,” based on their book of the same name.  The conversation with Kantor and Twohey will follow the movie screening. 

Carey Mulligan portrays Megan Twohey, and Zoe Kazan portrays Jodi Kantor in the film “She Said,”
based on the reporters’ book of the same name.

About Jodi Kantor and Megan Twohey

Jodi Kantor is a prize-winning investigative reporter and best-selling author whose work has revealed hidden truths about power, gender, technology, politics and culture. 

In October 2017, she and Megan Twohey broke the story of Harvey Weinstein’s decades of sexual abuse allegations. Before then, Kantor’s reporting on the havoc caused by automated scheduling systems in Starbucks workers’ lives spurred changes at the company and helped launch a national fair scheduling movement. After she and David Streitfeld investigated publishing practices at Amazon’s corporate headquarters, the company changed its human resources policies, introducing paternity leave and eliminating its employee ranking.

Kantor is also a contributor to “CBS Mornings.” 

Megan Twohey is a prize-winning investigative reporter for The New York Times who has focused much of her attention on the treatment of women and children.

In addition to breaking the story of Harvey Weinstein, she uncovered an underground network where parents gave away adopted children they no longer wanted to strangers they met on the internet. Known as private re-homing, the illicit practice took place with no government oversight and at great risk to children. “The Child Exchange” series prompted states to pass new laws to protect children. Two of the main subjects were sent to prison. Twohey testified before a U.S. Senate committee.

While reporting in Chicago, Twohey exposed how police and prosecutors were shelving DNA evidence collected after sex crimes, robbing victims of the chance for justice. In response to her stories, Illinois passed the first state law mandating the testing of every rape kit. 

Twohey is also a contributor to NBC and MSNBC.

In addition to her work on “As the World Turns,” Landon has also appeared on several other NBC shows, including “The Night Shift” and “Chicago Med.” She has proven herself to be a versatile actress who is capable of portraying a wide range of characters, from tough and gritty to vulnerable and emotional. Overall, Jennifer Landon’s career has been closely tied to NBC, as she has appeared on several of the network’s most popular shows over the years. Her talent and dedication to her craft have made her one of the most respected actresses of her generation, and she continues to be a force to be reckoned with in the entertainment industry.

Co-sponsors:
College of Literature, Science, and the Arts
Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy
Michigan Engineering
Office of Diversity, Equity & Inclusion

Remote Fellows Visit Ann Arbor

No Michigan experience would be complete without a visit to the Big House. Fellows got a behind-the-scenes peek at the stadium locker rooms, the legendary tunnel, luxury suites and the 50-yard line.

This article appeared in the Fall 2022 issue of the Wallace House Journal. 

If I had to write a self-help book about the week I spent in Ann Arbor this spring with the Knight-Wallace classes of 2021 and 2022, I’d call it “Chicken Soup for the Journalist’s Soul.”

The two fellowship classes from the pandemic years called ourselves “The Virtuals” because few of us had ever met in person, although we’d all spent an academic year attending seminars and making online connections with other Fellows from our cohorts.

These had been challenging times for many of us as we navigated through the havoc the pandemic caused in our professional and personal lives. And spikes in Covid cases had forced us to cancel at least two previously planned in-person fellowship gatherings. So by the time we arrived at Wallace House in April, most of us felt overdue for the face-to-face experience Wallace House Director Lynette Clemetson and Associate Director Robert Yoon had been telling us about for months.

Jose Fermoso ’22 shared a dance with street artist David Zinn’s Gene Kelly on the downtown library’s underground parking garage wall.

As much as I had anticipated the trip, I still wasn’t prepared for the warm and loving atmosphere that awaited us. Lynette, Rob, Alexis, Patty, Jayson, Melissa, Lisa and everyone associated with Knight- Wallace showed us the highest hospitality the entire week, and for the first time I felt like more than one of 11 participants in a great and robust fellowship.

I looked at the group photos on the wall of the classes that came before mine. I saw the gifts that each of these groups left behind.

And in those moments I realized that being part of the Knight- Wallace Fellowship wasn’t a year-long program. The other Fellows and I had joined a group of journalists who’d had the privilege of spending hours together at Wallace House laughing, crying, learning, growing and recharging so they could go back out into the world as better journalists and human beings.

Although we had several great activities during our week together, our most profound moments came in the sessions where we sat in the living room at Wallace House and shared our experiences. During the fellowship, many of us had relied upon one another for support and advice. But in person, the encouragement was infinitely more profound. It was, in short, the safest place I’ve ever had to share my experiences as a journalist.

I wasn’t alone. Nichole Dobo, one of the Fellows from my cohort, told me she similarly felt the warmth of being among “people who are bringing their whole selves to work.”

“Our backgrounds are our strengths, especially when we come from underrepresented communities,” Nickie said. “We only got one week in person, but it felt like so much longer. I left feeling empowered by the idea that things other people might see as a weakness are actually our superpowers.”

Nick St. Fleur organized a selfie with classmates from the Knight-Wallace Reporting Fellowship class of 2021-22 on the porch at Wallace House.

After our graduation ceremony, instead of sitting in small groups at the tables arranged in the backyard, we pushed all the tables together because none of us wanted to be apart from the others. That night, the jokes, war stories and heartfelt moments we shared belonged to all of us.

“I left feeling empowered by the idea that things other people might see as a weakness are actually our superpowers.”

Lester Feder from the class of 2021 remembered the dance party we had that evening after we pushed the chairs to the corners of the living room where we had shared so much in the days before.

“It was a moving reminder,” he said, “of the humanity of the people who give so much of themselves to this work, which demands that we give so much of ourselves.”

Daphne Duret is a 2022 Knight-Wallace Reporting Fellow and recently joined The Marshall Project as a staff writer covering policing issues across the country.

 

 

Fleeing Russia: Former Fellow Finds Solace in Ann Arbor

Novaya Gazeta headline "Russia. Bombs. Ukraine"
The front page of Novaya Gazeta, Russia’s independent newspaper, on Feb. 25, 2022, reads “Russia. Bombs. Ukraine.”

This article appeared in the Fall 2022 issue of the Wallace House Journal. 

Elena Milashina video thumbnail
Elena Milashina, 2010 Knight-Wallace Fellow and investigative journalist for Novaya Gazeta. On September 5, 2022, Russian authorities revoked the newspaper’s license.

It was early January 2022. Wallace House Director Lynette Clemetson wrote to me to ask if I could convince the freshly minted Nobel Peace Prize laureate Dmitry Muratov to come with me to Ann Arbor to give a lecture on press freedom.

“What an amazing idea,” I responded.

Muratov is my editor-in-chief, a mentor and friend under whom I have worked for a quarter century in one of the most respected newspapers in the world, Russia’s Novaya Gazeta.

When I dialed him to propose the Wallace House event, he didn’t answer at first. We were quarreling about my refusal to evacuate from Russia after the Chechen president, Ramzan Kadyrov, called me a “terrorist” and demanded that a criminal case be opened against me. Kadyrov’s assistant had publicly threatened to “cut off my head.”

Muratov eventually called me back. “Have you finally decided to listen to your editor and leave?” he asked.

“Only together with you, and only to Ann Arbor,” I joked.

I spent the next hour telling him about my incredible year as a Knight-Wallace Fellow more than a decade earlier, about the University of Michigan where Russian poet and fellow Nobel laureate Joseph Brodsky once taught. I told him about hearing President Barack Obama give the 2010 commencement address, warning that the world and professional journalism were in danger because of changing media habits – words people didn’t fully appreciate at the time. I told him about the beauty of Detroit, the catastrophic emptiness of some parts of the great American city and what it symbolized to me about civilization and history.

“I want to see it, too!” he said, greedy for such stories.

We began to make plans for a brief visit in April. But Vladymir Putin had plans of his own. On February 24, the Russian army invaded Ukraine. Three months earlier, Muratov had warned about the danger of such a war in his Nobel speech in Oslo, a war Putin had been moving toward for years. Suddenly it was happening.

Months before the war started, Putin was working to shut down the independent press.

Novaya Gazeta responded to the invasion with a bold and shocking headline: “Russia. Bombs. Ukraine.”

Months before the war started, Putin was working to shut down the independent press. After opposition politician Alexei Navalny’s return to Russia and imprisonment, authorities closed down dozens of independent media outlets, primarily those engaged in investigative journalism. The government labeled hundreds of journalists as foreign agents, enemies of the state.

Russian journalists lived in anticipation of searches, arrests and criminal cases. I removed all paper and electronic archives from my house, hid old notebooks, laptops and voice recorders at my friends’ places. I thought about how I would behave during a search to make sure that no sensitive information about my sources fell into the hands of Russian police and security agencies.

Yet even in an environment of active intimidation, I was not prepared for the war and its consequences.

The government quickly came after the few remaining news organizations. In the first days of March, the last independent TV news channel, Dozhd, and the oldest federal radio station, Ekho Moskvy, shut down.

I cannot accept that I cannot write about this atrocity under my own name in my newspaper.

Novaya Gazeta held on for 34 days, the last remaining independent news operation in the country. But on March 28 we, too, were forced to suspend operations. Putin’s draconian laws imposing jail sentences of up to 15 years for journalists who reported anything the government deemed “fake news” – anyone who reported the truth of what was happening in Ukraine – made it impossible for news organizations to continue working.

Soon there was another message from Lynette. With the April event clearly impossible, she had a different proposition. “Why don’t you come to Ann Arbor for a residency, Elena?” she said. “You don’t have to leave Russia forever. But here you will be safe, and you can figure out how to move forward.”

Now I am back at the University of Michigan, a place I consider my alma mater! I am a visiting Fellow, sponsored by Wallace House, at the Weiser Center for Emerging Democracies. I will be giving guest lectures and engaging with faculty and students. And most importantly, I will have a place to continue writing. When I arrived my suitcases were mostly full of papers, unfinished work, abruptly interrupted by war. I have much I still need to write.

More than six months into Putin’s attack on Ukraine, it seems the world is beginning to get used to war. I refuse to get used to it.

I cannot accept that my country is doing this.

I cannot accept that I cannot write about this atrocity under my own name in my newspaper.

I cannot accept that my newspaper no longer exists.

Now people all over the world know Novaya Gazeta and its journalists for our journalism and the repeated attacks against us. Now Russia has made it impossible for us to exist. But we will find a way to continue.

Novaya Gazeta literally means “new newspaper.” I remember when I went to work there 25 years ago after my first year at university. I traveled around the country introducing myself and my organization and people responded, “New newspaper? So what is it called?”

Now people all over the world know Novaya Gazeta and its journalists for our journalism and the repeated attacks against us. Now Russia has made it impossible for us to exist. But we will find a way to continue.

I arrived in Ann Arbor in July, late at night. As I entered town, it was too dark to see any of the places I so fondly remembered. I had two large suitcases full of my work. I checked into my hotel, got settled into my room and began to catch up on news from the front. It was expectedly grim. It felt unacceptable to me that I had been forced to flee my country to figure out a way to report the truth about it.

But for the first time in a very, very long time, I felt completely safe.

Elena Milashina is a 2010 Knight-Wallace Fellow. She is the inaugural WCED Freedoms Under Fire Residency Fellow in the International Institute’s Weiser Center for Emerging Democracies, a position sponsored by Wallace House.

Get to Know Jayson Rose, Our Development Officer

Jayson Rose, our senior development officer, has introduced himself to our Knight-Wallace alumni and Wallace House community since joining us in January.

This interview appeared in the Fall 2022 issue of the Wallace House Journal. 

Jayson Rose joined Wallace House in January 2022 as our first development officer. His work is critical as we strengthen our programs and respond to new opportunities. He’s set about introducing himself to all of our former Fellows going back to the program’s founding in 1973. His exuberant outreach has been met with gratitude and great stories (we’d expect nothing less of our alums). Lynette Clemetson asked Rose to take a little break and answer a few questions.

Lynette Clemetson: You’ve had in-person visits, calls, and Zooms with dozens of former Fellows. What have you learned?

Jayson Rose: I’ve connected with over 50 alumni in recent months from the U.S., Brazil and South Korea. I’ve learned how much the fellowship changed their lives, personally and professionally. Many have told me about how their time in Ann Arbor was a pivot point in their career, a time to regroup and refocus. I’ve also been learning how meaningful the relationships established have been and how many of our alums remain in contact with each other.

Clemetson: You’ve worked in university development for years. What’s the most exciting opportunity in connecting the work of Wallace House to donors and the mission of the university?

Rose: There is a tremendous opportunity to work with our campus partners to bring more attention to our mission, the urgency of our work, and to expand our constituent base. We are uniquely positioned to help donors who care about democracy and freedom of the press make an impact. Many people don’t know there’s an entity on Michigan’s campus that aligns with those ideals. I also believe we can help donors who want to create a legacy make a lasting impact by working with them to establish endowed gifts or planned gifts via their will or trust. Our goal is to give Wallace House the ability to have an impact on journalists’ lives well into the future.

Clemetson: You grew up around journalists. Your father, Jim Rose, is a longtime anchor and sports journalist in Chicago. Did that influence your interest in Wallace House?

Rose: My father has been in broadcast journalism for 41 years at ABC in Chicago. I have vivid memories growing up of all the hard work he put into his craft and the long hours he spent covering such a passionate sports town. He was, and continues to be, so thoughtful in his work and that made me grow up with a deep appreciation for journalism. The industry is facing numerous challenges, and the work of Wallace House is incredibly important to journalists who fight to tell the stories that aren’t easy. I am honored to have the opportunity to play a role in the evolution of such an incredible organization.

Clemetson: What do you do for fun? And an essential Wallace House question, what do you like to cook?

Rose: I enjoy exercising, catching a sporting event, and going on adventures with my wife, Kim, and our three kids, Cora, Carter and Ella. I have been learning how to become Mr. Fix-it, taking on projects around the house. And I enjoy new music and finding a new album to relax to when I have downtime. My favorite thing to cook is anything grilled. I love to grill a nice cut of steak. I also make a good grilled salmon with sriracha and honey glaze. Delish!

Clemetson: What new music caught your attention this summer?

Rose: Recently I’ve been enjoying a Nigerian singer-songwriter named Tems. Her album, “For Broken Ears,” was on repeat most of the summer for me.

Clemetson: You and I have something in common – we were both DJs in our younger years. I’ve been thinking about playlists for our 50th fellowship reunion in 2023. Any recommendations for a few hundred restless reporters who haven’t seen one another in a while?

Rose: If we are talking about moving a few tables and getting people on the dance floor, I might suggest:

“September” by Earth, Wind & Fire

“Don’t Stop Believin” by Journey

“Uptown Funk” by Mark Ronson featuring Bruno Mars

“Despacito” by Luis Fonsi

“Yeah!” by Usher

My DJ skills aren’t what they used to be, but you can’t go wrong with these.

Lynette Clemetson is the Director of Wallace House Center for Journalists, home of the Knight-Wallace Fellowships for Journalists and the Livingston Awards at the University of Michigan. She is a 2010 Knight-Wallace Fellow.

Introducing Our Expanded Name

Wallace House Center for Journalists

Wallace House, home of the Knight-Wallace Fellowships, the Livingston Awards and the Wallace House Presents event series, is now Wallace House Center for Journalists, a new name to reflect our expanding vision.

For nearly 50 years, Wallace House programs have been committed to fostering excellence in journalism. Starting with a grant in 1972 from the National Endowment for the Humanities to give accomplished journalists access to learning and research at the University of Michigan, we’ve grown into an internationally recognized organization that supports and develops the careers of journalists, advocates for press freedom issues, and promotes informed civic engagement. 

It’s now time to adapt our name to reflect our ever-growing work and core mission to support journalism by supporting journalists.

As press freedom is under attack and democracy is threatened around the world and at home, Wallace House Center for Journalists will continue to expand our reach and ambitions. We’re providing emergency support for reporters under siege, adapting our fellowship to address challenges facing the journalism industry and supporting journalists with resources to develop journalism ventures. 

You can still find us on these pages and follow us on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram under the username @UMWallaceHouse. We look forward to sharing our growing vision with you.

About Wallace House Center for Journalists

Wallace House Center for Journalists at the University of Michigan is committed to fostering excellence in journalism. We are home to programs that recognize, sustain and elevate the careers of journalists to address the challenges of journalism today, foster civic engagement and uphold the role of a free press in a democratic society. We believe in the fundamental mission of journalism to document, interpret, analyze and investigate the forces shaping society.

 

Elena Milashina of Russia’s Novaya Gazeta Joins the Weiser Center for Emerging Democracies

Elena Milashina returns to Wallace House after leaving Russia amid death threats and Putin’s shutdown of “Novaya Gazeta,”
Russia’s last remaining independent news outlet.

Supporting Journalists at Risk

After facing death threats for her reporting on human rights abuses in Chechnya and Russia, Elena Milashina, an award-winning Russian journalist and 2010 Knight-Wallace Fellow returned to the University of Michigan. Milashina is an investigative journalist for Novaya Gazeta, Russia’s last remaining independent newspaper before it ceased publication in March in response to threats from the Putin regime following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Sponsored by Wallace House, Milashina joins the International Institute’s Weiser Center for Emerging Democracies as the inaugural WCED Freedoms Under Fire Residency Fellow. The new fellowship brings prominent and courageous activists, journalists, and scholars from across the globe to WCED as a way both of evading persecution in their home countries and sharing their unique personal insights with the U-M community and broader public on how dictatorships and eroding democracies repress vital individual freedoms.

“Wallace House is committed to advancing the freedom and safety of journalists around the world. When we can provide for the safety of one journalist, we are safeguarding their journalism, their voice and the public’s right to the truth,” said Lynette Clemetson, director of Wallace House.

In February of this year, Milashina went into hiding after numerous threats from Kremlin-backed Chechen leaders and continued to report on human rights abuses from an undisclosed location. Since 2000, Novaya Gazeta, whose editor-in-chief, Dmitry Muratov, won the 2021 Nobel Peace Prize, has seen six of its journalists and contributors killed.

“I am very grateful to Wallace House and the Weiser Center for Emerging Democracies for this opportunity,” said Milashina. “The University of Michigan for me is not just a safe place to continue my work. Without exaggeration, this is one of the best places to exchange experiences and learn things, which very often a journalist simply does not have time for.”

Milashina’s reporting has uncovered enforced disappearances, arbitrary detentions, extrajudicial executions, torture, and persecution of relatives of alleged insurgents in Chechnya and beyond. She came to the university in September 2009 as a Knight-Wallace Fellow, where she studied ethnic and religious conflicts in the North Caucasus. Following her fellowship, she exposed Chechnya’s crackdown on gay men, which caused Muslim clerics in Chechnya to deliver a sermon calling for “retribution” against her and other journalists. She is the recipient of Human Rights Watch’s Alison Des Forges Award for Extraordinary Activism and the International Women of Courage Award. 

“Journalists are in the crosshairs of democratic backsliding all around the world, not least in Putin’s Russia,” said Dan Slater, director of WCED.  “Our new Freedoms Under Fire fellowship is designed to invite some of the world’s most courageous and principled opponents of authoritarian practices to Michigan’s campus. Elena Milashina is an ideal first recipient of this fellowship, and we are privileged to host her. Elena’s remarkable story should remind us all that Putin’s victims reside in Russia as well as Ukraine, and that the global struggle for full democratic freedoms must never be limited or defined by national boundaries.”

Last March, Milashina spoke with us on camera from an undisclosed location and discussed the demise of a free press under Putin’s regime and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Then as now, she remains determined to continue championing the truth. As a WCED Freedoms Under Fire Residency Fellow, Milashina will give guest lectures, engage with students and faculty, and continue her writing to report the truth about what is happening in Ukraine, Russia, and the region.

Wallace House Center for Journalists at the University of Michigan is committed to fostering excellence in journalism. We are home to programs that recognize, sustain and elevate the careers of journalists to address the challenges of journalism today, foster civic engagement and uphold the role of a free press in a democratic society. We believe in the fundamental mission of journalism to document, interpret, analyze and investigate the forces shaping society.

The Weiser Center for Emerging Democracies at the University of Michigan’s International Institute promotes scholarship to better understand the conditions and policies fostering transformations from authoritarian rule to democracy. WCED’s mission will evolve as the world changes, but its core commitment to understanding the conditions for democracy and freedom will remain the guiding principle.

The 35th Graham Hovey Lecture with Scott Tong, host of NPR’s “Here & Now”

“China’s Paradox: Authoritarianism and Weakness”

September 15, 2022 | 5 p.m.
Reception following lecture

Wallace House Gardens
620 Oxford Road, Ann Arbor

Welcome remarks by Tabbye Chavous,
Vice Provost for Equity and Inclusion and Chief Diversity Officer

This event is in-person.

Watch the video recording.

Wallace House announces the return of our outdoor, in-person Graham Hovey Lecture

In 2013, longtime China correspondent Scott Tong came to the Knight-Wallace Fellowships to research China’s on-again, off-again ties with the global community and how it connected with his own family. The resulting book, “A Village with My Name: A Family History of China’s Opening to the World,” examines nationalism and globalization through the stories of five generations of Tongs. China’s openness to the western world delivered great benefits to the country yet came at a devasting human price during Mao’s communist rule. In the end, this openness made it possible for Tong to become an American journalist covering China.

Today, Beijing’s increasingly antagonistic relations with Washington and many advanced economies present a great risk to its own economy and high-tech development.

Now a co-host of NPR’s Here & Now Tong returns to Wallace House to deliver the 35th Graham Hovey Lecture and discuss Beijing’s increasing authoritarianism and international aggression and what it signals for its own future and that of globalization.

About the Speaker

Scott Tong is an author and the co-host of Here & Now, NPR’s midday news magazine, produced at WBUR. Previously he spent 16 years at Marketplace as Shanghai bureau chief and senior correspondent. As a 2014 Knight-Wallace Fellow at the University of Michigan, Tong explored comparative ecosystems, innovation and the history of China.

About the Graham Hovey Lecture

The annual Graham Hovey Lecture recognizes a Knight-Wallace journalist whose career exemplifies the benefits of a fellowship at the University of Michigan and whose ensuing work is at the forefront of our national conversations. The event is named for the late Graham Hovey, director of the fellowship program from 1980 to 1986 and a distinguished journalist for The New York Times.

 

This event is outdoors. Wallace House will follow the University of Michigan’s Covid protocol and guidelines for this in-person event.

Michigan Radio
Michigan Radio

Michigan Radio is a co-sponsor of this event.

Announcing the 2022 Livingston Award Winners

2022 Livingston Award winners (clockwise from top-left) Alex Stuckey of the Houston Chronicle, Jose A. Del Real of The Washington Post, Erika Lantz and Elin Lantz Lesser of Rococo Punch and iHeartRadio, and the Richard M. Clurman Award recipient, the late Fred Hiatt.

Today the Livingston Awards honor stories that represent the best in local, national and international reporting by journalists under the age of 35. The winning stories highlight Texas’s troubled mental healthcare system, the spread of viral disinformation and its effects on personal relationships, and the darker side of a religious order founded by Mother Theresa. The $10,000 prizes are for work released in 2021.

The Livingston Awards also honored the late Fred Hiatt, editorial page editor of The Washington Post, with the Richard M. Clurman Award for mentoring. The $5,000 prize is given each year to an experienced journalist who has played a pivotal role in guiding and nurturing the careers of young reporters. The prize is named for the late Richard M. Clurman, former chief of correspondents for Time-Life News Service and architect of the Livingston Awards.

Livingston Awards national judges Raney Aronson-Rath of Frontline, María Elena Salinas of ABC News, Anna Quindlen, author, and Bret Stephens of The New York Times introduced the winners at a ceremony, hosted by former long-serving Livingston Awards national judge Dean Baquet of The New York Times.

“Reading the Livingston Award entries we are reminded of the power of journalism to chronicle not just the biggest stories of the moment, but also looming crises and long ago misdeeds only now being called to account. This year’s winners each crafted beautifully nuanced portraits of the consequences of systemic failures and loss of trust in institutions,” said Lynette Clemetson, director of Wallace House. “Through meticulous reporting, they leave us no choice but to ponder the responsibility of those in power and our individual roles in either perpetuating or changing the systems that guide our lives.” 

Celebrating its 41st year, the awards bolster the work of young reporters, create the next generation of journalism leaders and mentors, and advance civic engagement around powerful storytelling. The sponsors include the University of Michigan, Knight Foundation, the Indian Trail Charitable Foundation, the Mollie Parnis Livingston Foundation, Christiane Amanpour, the Fred and Judy Wilpon Foundation, Dr. Gil Omenn and Martha Darling, and Google News Inititative.

The 2022 winners for work released in 2021 are listed below.

Local Reporting

Alex Stuckey, 31, of the Houston Chronicle for “In Crisis,” an investigation of Texas’s mental health facilities, revealing an underfunded system shrouded in secrecy, where patient care takes a backseat to blame-avoidance. Her work prompted new state procedures and legislation to begin to address these problems.

“Alex Stuckey’s vivid accountability journalism about the challenges people living with severe mental illness face in Texas reveals a state in crisis and a serious bureaucratic breakdown with devastating human consequences. The systematic failure in Texas set against the stories of individual families is both urgent and heartbreaking and a model of great journalism. Drawing on a long-standing personal interest in care for those living with mental illness, her investigation illustrates a complex web of state level policies and failures that have a dire impact on the people who need the services the most.” – Raney Aronson-Rath

National Reporting

Jose A. Del Real, 31, of The Washington Post for “Truth, Trust and Conspiracy Theories in America,” a series examining viral disinformation, how it spreads and the impact it has on the personal relationships of those involved.

“As we try to navigate this complicated world we are living in, chock full of divisions and conspiracy theories that lead to anger and hatred, it is refreshing to read the humanity that Jose Del Real put into his stories on this very perplexing issue. He treats his characters with respect and compassion and helps the reader try to understand what moves them. Jose Del Real is a gem who so eloquently reminds us that conspiracy theories are part of American history and that only truth and trust can attempt to overcome them.” – María Elena Salinas

International Reporting

Erika Lantz, 31, and Elin Lantz Lesser, 30, of RococoPunch and iHeartRadio for “The Turning, The Sisters Who Left” a podcast series exploring the insular world of the Missionaries of Charity, the religious order founded by Mother Theresa, and the darker side of devotion.

“Sometimes it is the intimate, the human, that unexpectedly illuminates the great world for us. That was the case for me with ‘The Turning: The Sisters Who Left.’ In the anguished words of women who had entered the Missionaries of Charity, the religious order founded by Mother Teresa, I heard the classic dilemma of women’s lives: sacrifice versus freedom. Following faith and seeking to serve the poor, these women had discovered a system of isolation and control that began to break their spirits. Their stories were told with such care and sensitivity that their struggles lived within me afterward, less a podcast, more a world.” – Anna Quindlen

Mentoring Award

Fred Hiatt, editorial editor of The Washington Post, was honored posthumously with the Richard M. Clurman Award for his personal commitment to counsel, nurture and inspire young journalists.

“Somehow, Fred saw through the writer I was to the writer I wanted to be, one I couldn’t have become without his patience and support, one encouraging email at a time…Fred must have had access to some reservoir of time that most people do not, because I can name dozens of people who feel the same gratitude for the doors he opened.” – Alexandra Petri of The Washington Post.

In addition to Aronson-Rath, Salinas, Quindlen and Stephens, the Livingston national judging panel includes Ken Auletta of The New Yorker; John Harris of Politico; Matt Murray of The Wall Street Journal; Clarence Page of the Chicago Tribune; Lydia Polgreen of Gimlet; and Kara Swisher of The New York Times and Vox Media.

More on the winners here.

The Eisendrath Symposium with Elena Milashina, Simon Ostrovsky and Ronald Suny

While the Russian invasion of Ukraine swiftly united NATO and western nations in condemning Putin, enacting sanctions and supplying defense weapons, there are growing cries for the U.S. and its NATO allies to do more militarily. Join Knight-Wallace journalists who have reported extensively from the region and a U-M policy expert as they examine Putin’s suppression of a free press, the call for direct military support, and the geopolitical, economic and humanitarian consequences of the growing conflict.

Elena Milashina is an award-winning senior investigative reporter for Novaya Gazeta, the acclaimed independent Russian news organization that recently ceased publication in response to threats of closure and imprisonment from the Putin regime. Simon Ostrovsky is a video journalist and filmmaker who reports for PBS NewsHour and The New York Times. Ronald Suny is a professor of history and political science at U-M and a senior researcher at the National Research University-Higher School of Economics in Saint Petersburg, Russia.

Wallace House Director, Lynette Clemetson, will lead this discussion.

The Eisendrath Symposium on International Reporting honors Charles R. Eisendrath, former director of Wallace House, and his lifelong commitment to international journalism.

About the Speakers

Elena Milashina is a 2009-2010 Knight-Wallace Fellow and an investigative journalist “Novaya Gazeta,” Russia’s last remaining independent newspaper before it ceased publication in response to threats from the Putin regime. She investigates and brings to attention accounts of enforced disappearances, arbitrary detentions, extrajudicial executions, torture, and persecution of relatives of alleged insurgents, women’s rights in Chechnya and beyond. Milashina exposed a major crackdown on gay men in Chechnya in spring 2017, investigated the catastrophe of the Kursk submarine, and hostage crises in Moscow and Beslan. She has documented atrocities committed by both sides during the 2008 Russia-Georgia conflict and pressed for an end to impunity. She has repeatedly received death threats from the Chechen authorities. She is the recipient of Human Rights Watch’s Alison Des Forges Award for Extraordinary Activism ad the International Women of Courage Award.

Simon Ostrovsky is a 2021-2022 Knight-Wallace Reporting Fellow. As a Special Correspondent for PBS NewsHour and an investigative journalist, he is best known for his coverage of the Crimea crisis and the war in eastern Ukraine for which he was nominated for two Emmys. He won a DuPont Award from Columbia University in 2015 for his “Selfie Soldiers” documentary, which tracked Russian soldiers in Ukraine through their social media posts, and an Emmy Award in 2014 as a producer of VICE on HBO. Ostrovsky has covered extensively the countries of the former Soviet Union, where he witnessed five revolutions and four wars. He has served as South Caucasus Bureau Chief for Agence France Presse and as an investigative reporter at CNN. His work also has appeared on the BBC and CBS News’ “60 Minutes.”

Ronald Suny is the William H. Sewell Jr. Distinguished University Professor of History and Professor of Political Science at the University of Michigan and Emeritus Professor of Political Science and History at the University of Chicago.  The grandson of the composer and ethnomusicologist Grikor Mirzaian Suni and a graduate of Swarthmore College and Columbia University, he taught at Oberlin College (1968-1981), as visiting professor of history at the University of California, Irvine (1987), and Stanford University (1995-1996).  He also served as Senior Researcher at the National Research University, Higher School of Economics, Saint Petersburg (2014-2016).  He was the first holder of the Alex Manoogian Chair in Modern Armenian History at the University of Michigan (1981-1995), where he founded and directed the Armenian Studies Program. 

About the Moderator

Lynette Clemetson is the Charles R. Eisendrath Director of Wallace House, home of the Knight-Wallace Fellowships for Journalists and the Livingston Awards for Young Journalists at the University of Michigan.

Thank you to our co-sponsors:

Knight Foundation

Michigan Radio

Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy

Weiser Center for Europe and Eurasia

Center for Russian, East European, and Eurasian Studies

Detroit Public Television

PBS Books

Jayson Rose Joins Wallace House as Senior Development Officer

 

 

Wallace House at the University of Michigan welcomes Jayson Rose as its Senior Development Officer. 

In this newly created role, Rose will be responsible for developing and managing annual giving, major gifts and institutional support needed to advance the mission and programs of Wallace House. Working jointly with Wallace House director Lynette Clemetson and the Office of University Development leadership, Rose will identify gift prospects, with a focus on connecting the philanthropic interests and passions of Wallace House friends, alumni and donors to our journalism programs in meaningful ways.

“As Wallace House expands its vision, it is imperative that we respond thoughtfully to the many supporters who reach out to us with interest in helping to foster our programs and journalism’s vital role to our democracy,” said Lynette Clemetson. “Jayson’s background and expertise will allow us to develop these philanthropic interests strategically with an eye to the future. We are thrilled to welcome him.”

Rose comes to Wallace House with deep development experience. He recently oversaw fundraising efforts for three divisions within Duke University’s academic medicine fundraising entity, Duke Health Development and Alumni Affairs. Before joining Duke, Rose spent more than three years at his alma mater, Western Michigan University, as the Director of Major Gifts. In that role, he helped raise five, six and seven-figure gifts for various entities across the campus. His previous academic experience also includes time at Iowa State University, helping to lead efforts at their business school. Rose was also Associate Director of Development for Student Life at the University of Michigan and points to that experience as a turning point in his professional career. 

Rose is known for being a collaborative and compassionate fundraising professional who is committed to helping donors make a lasting impact through philanthropy.  Throughout his career, he has played a prominent role in securing resources for student scholarships, faculty support, endowed funds, planned gifts and other areas of need. Rose helped drive strategies that led to philanthropic support tied to billion-dollar-plus campaigns, including “Forever True, For Iowa State,” and, we are happy to include, “Victors for Michigan.”

Before his career in fundraising, Rose worked for Phoenix Media in Chicago and was a professional DJ lending his services to corporations and world-famous athletes and celebrities, including Derek Jeter, Michael Jordan, and Michael Bublé.

Rose earned his B.A. from Western Michigan University with a concentration in Economics. He will start at Wallace House on January 31.