Video: Fifth Annual Awards for Excellence in Journalism
Gala 2012 from CUNY Grad School of Journalism on Vimeo.
The CUNY Graduate School of Journalism honored two men for their accomplishments in the fields of journalism and philanthropy at the fifth annual Awards for Excellence in Journalism gala at TheTimesCenter on May 14.
Matthew Winkler, editor-in-chief of Bloomberg News, received the Lifetime Achievement Award in Journalism while Leonard Tow, a pioneer in the cable television industry, was the first recipient of the Distinguished Service to New York Award.
The event also honored three alumni from the recently graduated Class of 2011: Alva French received the Dean’s Award, Nadia Sussman won the Sidney Hillman Foundation Award for Social Justice Reporting, and Patrick Clark captured the Frederic Wiegold Award for Business Journalism.
New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who hired Winkler from The Wall Street Journal in 1990 to start a news wire for Bloomberg’s growing business information company, introduced his longtime associate and friend. He called Winkler “someone who has reshaped the entire industry of business journalism” and “a visionary leader, a brilliant journalist, and an outstanding editor.”
In his lead-up to Tow, CUNY Chancellor Matthew Goldstein named some of the organizations the philanthropist has supported with gifts of millions of dollars, including the CUNY J-School’s Tow-Knight Center for Entrepreneurial Journalism, the Columbia University Medical Center, the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, the new Claire Tow Theater at Lincoln Center, and a performing arts center at Brooklyn College. “His giving is strategic, directed as to have the most impact,” Goldstein said. “Leonard believes as I do in the power of leverage. He likes to challenge others, stimulate them to aim high and drive forward, and make a difference.”
Dean Stephen B. Shepard praised Winkler for bringing “traditional journalism into the digital age,” and he called Tow “one of the great unsung philanthropists in New York history.”
