Girion of Reuters wins inaugural WERT Prize

Lisa Girion

The Knight-Bagehot Fellowships in Economics and Business at Columbia University named Lisa Girion of Reuters as the inaugural recipient of the WERT Prize, dedicated to honoring excellence in business reporting and writing by a woman journalist.

Girion’s winning work “Powder Keg” is a deeply reported investigation into Johnson and Johnson’s extensive knowledge of the existence of asbestos in its baby powder.

The finalists for the prize this year included Vivienne Walt of Fortune magazine for “Blood, Sweat and Batteries” and Megha Rajagopalan of Buzzfeed for “We Had To Stop Facebook: When Anti-Muslim Violence Goes Viral.”

The award will be presented on Oct. 16 at the 44th Knight-Bagehot Anniversary Dinner in New York.

“We are excited to honor and recognize the winner of this year’s WERT Prize,” said Raju Narisetti, director of the Knight-Bagehot Fellowships, in a statement. “Lisa’s compelling business journalism in the public interest embodies the spirit of the award, and we hope her work, along with those of the two finalists, inspires more gender diversity in the field, a main goal for this new prize.”

Girion will receive $4,000 in the inaugural year, which also includes a one-time honorarium from the Muriel Siebert Foundation to celebrate the 40th anniversary of the Women’s Economic Round Table.

Girion joined the Los Angeles bureau of Reuters as a top news editor in January 2016 after 16 years at the Los Angeles Times, where she also produced major multimedia stories on the intersection of government, commerce, health and welfare.

Chris Roush

Chris Roush was the dean of the School of Communications at Quinnipiac University in Hamden, Connecticut. He was previously Walter E. Hussman Sr. Distinguished Professor in business journalism at UNC-Chapel Hill. He is a former business journalist for Bloomberg News, Businessweek, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, The Tampa Tribune and the Sarasota Herald-Tribune. He is the author of the leading business reporting textbook "Show me the Money: Writing Business and Economics Stories for Mass Communication" and "Thinking Things Over," a biography of former Wall Street Journal editor Vermont Royster.

Recent Posts

Making financial news more accessible

CNBC Make It reporter Ashton Jackson writes about ways to make financial news more accessible to consumers.…

2 hours ago

SABEW names Best in Business Book winners

The Society for Advancing Business Editing and Writing announced Wednesday the winners and finalists for…

7 hours ago

Business leaders turning away from traditional biz news outlets

Business professionals are turning away from traditional business media sources such as newspapers, magazines and…

7 hours ago

Wired seeks a reporter to cover tech companies

WIRED seeks a reporter to cover tech companies and their influence, with a particular focus…

8 hours ago

Austin daily hires Leonard as tech reporter

Karoline Leonard has been hired by the Austin American-Statesman as a technology reporter. Leonard graduated from…

11 hours ago

WSJ reporter Evans departs for Tradeoffs

Wall Street Journal reporter Melanie Evans has left the news organization for Tradeoffs, a nonprofit news organization…

12 hours ago