Programs/Content

POV and StoryCorps each receive $1 million from MacArthur Foundation

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American Documentary, home to PBS’s independent film showcase POV, and StoryCorps, the oral history project heard on NPR, are each receiving $1 million from the MacArthur Foundation’s latest round of Awards for Creative and Effective Institutions. The grants, awarded to 13 recipients in five countries, help ensure the long-term sustainability of each organization, according to the foundation. “The award is not only recognition for past leadership and success but also an investment in the future,” the Chicago-based foundation said in the Feb. 28 announcement. “Organizations will use this support to build cash reserves and endowments, develop strategic plans and upgrade technology and physical infrastructure.”

Organizations do not apply for the awards; rather, MacArthur nominates and selects them.

Programs/Content

POV, StoryCorps get $1 million each from MacArthur Foundation

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American Documentary, home to PBS’s independent film showcase POV, and StoryCorps, the oral history project heard on NPR, are each receiving $1 million as recipients of the latest round of MacArthur Foundation Awards for Creative and Effective Institutions, announced today. The grants help ensure the long-term sustainability of the winners, 13 organizations in five countries, according to the foundation. “The award is not only recognition for past leadership and success but also an investment in the future,” the Chicago-based foundation said in the announcement. “Organizations will use this support to build cash reserves and endowments, develop strategic plans and upgrade technology and physical infrastructure.”

Organizations do not apply for the awards; rather, MacArthur nominates and selects them. To qualify, the foundation said, nonprofits must “demonstrate exceptional creativity and effectiveness; have reached a critical or strategic point in their development; show strong leadership and stable financial management; have previously received MacArthur support; and engage in work central to one of MacArthur’s core programs.”

People

NPR, Frontline cited for 2013 duPont-Columbia Awards

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Public media outlets were cited for six 2013 Alfred I. duPont-Columbia Awards, announced today by the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism. NPR received three awards, with one given to reporters Deborah Amos and Kelly McEvers for their coverage of Syria. “NPR’s series of daily news reports about the conflict in Syria was wide ranging, balanced and in depth,” the announcement said. “Veteran foreign correspondent Deb Amos provided critical context and explanation in her reporting that helped listeners understand the complex sectarian and regional factors at play. Her reporting from inside Syria at the scene of a massacre and the capitol Damascus documented spikes in violence.”

“Correspondent Kelly McEvers brought a focus on individual stories that made the conflict real in human terms,” the citation said.

Programs/Content

StoryCorps launches newest project – Military Voices Initiative

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For the next year StoryCorps, the public radio group collecting and presenting life stories told between family members and friends, will undertake a new initiative to record oral histories of veterans and active-duty members of the armed forces serving in  Iraq and Afghanistan. The Military Voices Initiative, or MVI, plans interviews of more than 2,000 people, enough to produce more than 700 stories. Funded by CPB and the Boeing Company, MVI is StoryCorps’ eighth initiative focused on a specific ethnic community or news event.  The Griot initiative, for example, collected stories of African-American family life. Some of interviews conducted for MVI will be broadcast on NPR’s Weekend Edition while the entire collection will be housed at the American Folklife Center at the Library of Congress. CPB and StoryCorps, a nonprofit founded by indie radio producer David Isay, officially launched the initiative Dec.

Awards

Lourdes Garcia-Navarro was honored for distinguished reporting from the world’s most volatile regions.

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NPR’s Jerusalem-based foreign correspondent received CPB’s highest award, recognizing outstanding contributions to public radio, during an April 9 dinner attended by top pubcasting execs. Garcia-Navarro reported from NPR’s Baghdad bureau from 2008 to 2009, and was one of the first reporters to enter Libya after last year’s uprising. She made in-depth reporting of events from the world’s most volatile regions a hallmark of her reporting, providing “powerful and sound-rich descriptions” of the conflict in Libya and other hotspots. “It is fitting that Lourdes receive this award named after the famed war correspondent,” said CPB Chair Bruce Ramer. “We honor her dedication and service, as well as the courage of those like her who ensure that we are all informed about important world events and issues.”

“Oh, Lulu — you have made us so proud,” said Margaret Low Smith, NPR programming chief, in a videotape reel of congratulations from colleagues.

People

StoryCorps’ multiplatform production on the anniversary of 9/11 earned a prize for public radio and TV.

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The Peabody-winning segment aired on NPR’s Morning Edition and featured interviews that had been adapted as animated shorts for PBS’s POV. The award, one of nine presented for pubcasting programs this year, recognized the oral history project’s treatment of interviews with the relatives of 9/11 victims in commemoration of the 10th anniversary of the 2001 attacks on New York’s World Trade Center. NPR received two additional trophies for its radio reporting. Judges cited “Arab Spring from Egypt to Libya” by foreign correspondent Lourdes Garcia-Navarro for “exemplary coverage throughout the Middle East,” and “Native Foster Care: Lost Children, Shattered Families,” a three-part NPR News Investigation by Laura Sullivan and Amy Walters. POV received another Peabody for “My Perestroika,”a doc following five young Russians over several years after the collapse of communism.

People

MPT hires new v.p., Sill to be KPCC’s executive editor, three Illinois pubcasters retire, and more…

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Rick Lore is Maryland Public Television’s new v.p. and chief development officer
Lore is responsible for membership, on-air fundraising, major and planned giving, publications, outreach and community engagement at the state network headquartered in Owings Mills. Lore joined MPT on an interim basis last fall after Joe Krushinsky left his job as v.p. of institutional advancement. Krushinsky now directs station development services at PBS. Previously Lore served as executive director of Friends of Milwaukee Public Television, the fundraising affiliate of Milwaukee Public TV; directed  on-air fundraising for PBS; and led development at New Hampshire Public Television. Lore, who began his pubTV career in 1989 in San Jose, Calif., has won eight PBS development awards and is a frequent conference speaker.

Programs/Content

StoryCorps puts flesh on bones of history

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Danny and Annie Perasa enjoyed the sort of dream marriage promised in diamond ads and sappy romantic comedies, only it all actually happened. All the laughs, the finished sentences, the little love letters — “glorified weather reports,” Annie called them — that Danny would leave for “my princess” each morning on the kitchen table at home in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn. All the funny stories. Like the one about Danny, with his monumentally bad eyesight, mistaking a herd of goats in St. Martin for a pack of “really incredible leaping dogs.” Or about the time he befriended a crew of Hells Angels on Long Island, who put him on the back of a chopper and gave him a lift to the train station.

Programs/Content

With StoryCorps, Isay campaigns to save Grandma’s tales

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Last week a miniature mobile recording studio came to rest in Vanderbilt
Hall of New York’s Grand Central Terminal, marking the debut of StoryCorps,
an ambitious undertaking led by independent public radio producer David Isay. StoryCorps aims to popularize the recording of oral histories by making
it easy for average Americans to interview one another. Each mini-studio,
called a StoryBooth, features tables, chairs, digital recording equipment
and a trained facilitator in a quiet, comfortable setting. Booth users are encouraged to bring older relatives and, in 40 minutes of
talking, tease out their stories. They walk away with a compact disc of the
interview, and another copy goes to a new Library of Congress archive.