Place Name: First Place Contestant Name: The Cap Times Entry Title: COVID in Dane County Entry Credit: Allison Garfield Judge Comment: Truly a nice piece of journalist effort in covering the topic. Comprehensive reporting in providing answers to questions which might be asked by readers. Excellence reporting covering the issues and showing angles on the coronavirus topic. Criteria included accuracy and completeness, clarity and insight, enterprise and creativity, and journalistic impact—all were there. Reporting included a variety of data, contacting many sources, and using quotes to make the stories. Also noted were complaints. Would have been happy to have this coverage in my newspaper.
Place Name: Second Place Contestant Name: The Post-Crescent Entry Title: Here's what it's like inside ThedaCare's COVID unit, where another virus wave feels like 'Groundhog Day' Entry Credit: Madeline Heim Judge Comment: Covering COVID-19 is more than noting that beds are not available at most hospitals; it’s also showing the unreported stories that need to be told. And these stories do that. They meet the criteria of accuracy, completeness, clarity, enterprise, and journalistic impact, but they also use a variety of sources and interviews to show how a day feels at work, how nurses are being trained, the inability to accept patients or transfers, and death of patients. These are stories of excellence in reporting. Good work.
Place Name: Third Place Contestant Name: The Post-Crescent Entry Title: Children under 5 can now be vaccinated against COVID. Here's what it means to Wisconsin's child care and early education providers Entry Credit: Madison Lammert Judge Comment: The age of when to give the vaccine to small children is a COVID topic, but this story includes coverage of when to vaccine, parental control, sources from keepers of children, and quotes for several sources. Excellent reporting with a much broader approach. I like the angles covered. Clearly, the story shows accuracy, is complete, had clarity and enterprise, and journalistic impact. The impact includes opinion and some nice parental quotes. Good work.
Place Name: Honorable Mention Contestant Name: The Cap Times Entry Title: COVID and businesses in Dane County Entry Credit: Natalie Yahr Judge Comment: An interesting combination of entries on some underreported stories and issues and new angles. Readers learned of ways businesses are affected, court cases, the surprise of more businesses applied for during the pandemic, use and non-use of masks. Good reporting with completeness, clarity, enterprise and creativity, and impact. If you wanted something different in stories or angles, you found it in these stories.
Competition Comment: Folks, you turned in some great stories in this category. The entry instructions called for some underreported stories and issues or exploring new angles on familiar topics. You understood the instructions, and your readers had such stories to read. I hope they enjoyed them as much as I did. The criteria outlines also were found throughout the stories. I found an ample number of facts with sources identified. I loved the quotes, and some included some complains or comments by people. I was touched with some emotion in several stories and often felt sad. After reading and rereading, I made the winners but many others were of equal quality. You did some good reporting.
