The Dow Jones News Fund announced Thursday that Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and author Geeta Anand as the recipient of the inaugural Richard J. Levine Journalism Champion Award.
The Journalism Champion Award was established in August 2022 to honor those whose work supports the perpetuation of a strong and diverse free press. The award also pays tribute to the late News Fund president and longtime Dow Jones news executive Richard J. Levine and his contributions to journalism.
Levine, who died in March 2022, was a steadfast champion of the important role of a free press in society, having spent his entire career as a reporter, editor and manager at The Wall Street Journal and Dow Jones. The recipient of the annual award is selected from a group of nominees by a committee of Dow Jones News Fund staff and board members.
Anand is the dean of the Cal-Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism, where in the two years since she became the school’s first female dean, she has taken meaningful steps to facilitate opportunities for historically marginalized groups in journalism. Most prominently, she secured $25 million to fund an unprecedented effort to support and strengthen local reporting in underserved and historically underrepresented areas throughout California and established a new fellowship program for youth in Richmond, California, to receive stipends to attend core Introduction to Reporting classes at the school.
Anand has had a prestigious journalism career spanning 27 years, most recently as a foreign correspondent for the New York Times and The Wall Street Journal in India, where she was born and raised. Her reporting on corporate corruption won The Journal a Pulitzer Prize in 2002, and her lead reporting in a series on healthcare was a finalist for the prize in 2003.
“Geeta Anand’s demonstrated commitment to journalism education and rigorous, impactful news coverage, as well as strong values including diversity, make her a standout choice as the first recipient of the Richard J. Levine Journalism Champion Award,” said Dow Jones News Fund President Brent Jones in a statement. “Her leadership and body of work align perfectly with the News Fund’s early-in-career talent mission and Richard’s remarkable record of service and stewardship of high journalistic standards.”
