NBC, CBS, 'Nova' among 2017 duPont-Columbia Award winners

NEW YORK – The European migrant crisis, environmental perils and the racial divide are among the issues confronted by winners of the 2017 Alfred I. duPont-Columbia University Awards honoured for their work in broadcast, digital and documentary journalism. Columbia’s Graduate School of Journalism announced this year’s 14 winners on Thursday.

Four awards go to local television news investigations: KXAN-TV in Austin, Texas, for documenting racial profiling, WVIT-TV in West Hartford, Connecticut, for uncovering widespread faulty home construction, Indianapolis’ WTHR-TV for exposing a corrupt charity, and Atlanta’s WXIA-TV for spotlighting problems with the 911 emergency system.

Public broadcasting wins four awards, including “Frontline” for its Syria and Iraq reporting and “Nova” for its coverage of climate change. Other awards go to Michigan Radio’s coverage of the Flint water crisis and NPR/Colorado Public Radio’s expose on the Army’s mistreatment of disabled veterans.

Two duPonts go to the broadcast networks. NBC News’ “Dateline” wins for its program “The Cosby Accusers Speak,” while CBS News is being honoured for its breaking coverage of the migrant crisis.

An award goes to HBO Documentary Films and SOC Films for “A Girl in the River: The Price of Forgiveness,” which explored how the need for patriarchal respect in Pakistan can be used to justify a daughter’s murder. ESPN wins for its eight-hour documentary project, “OJ: Made in America.”

The Ground Truth Project, a non-profit news organization, wins for “Foreverstan: The Girls’ School” and “Razia’s Way,” a hybrid film, digital and podcast look at Afghan women’s education. Another hybrid work, “Death by Fentanyl,” wins for the Fusion multi-platform media company.

In 2017, the duPont-Columbia Awards will celebrate their 75th anniversary with special events featuring distinguished past winners and award-winning reporting in the public service, including Ira Glass, of “This American Life” and a past winner of four duPonts, and a tribute to PBS news anchor Gwen Ifill, who died in November.

“In their 75th year, the duPont Awards continue to recognize the vital contributions to public knowledge made by free, fair and probing journalists,” said Bill Wheatley, chairman of this year’s awards jury.

The awards will be presented on Jan. 25 at Columbia.

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