Award
Winners
1997
MEDIA AWARD
NATIONAL
LEVEL -- LONG-TERM ACHIEVEMENT AWARD
JUDY FOREMAN
The Boston Globe
Boston, Massachusetts
Judy
Foreman has been one of a handful of journalists on the national scene who
has overed the age beat with consistently illuminating, sensitive and factual
reporting on issues of concern to an aging America. She has won ASA's National
Media and Aging Award two times since its inception. This past year alone
her body of work included stories on caregiving, "Love in the Twilight,"
loneliness, foot problems, thyroid problems, and firearm use. In recognition
of Judy Foreman's consistently high-quality coverage of aging concerns that
has expanded public awareness and understanding, ASA presents her with its
first Long-Term Achievement Award in Media and Aging.
Judy Foreman, a staff
writer at The Boston Globe since 1978 and a medical and science writer
since 1985, graduated Phi Beta Kappa from Wellesley College in 1966. After
three years in the Peace Corps in Brazil, she earned a master's in education
from Harvard University Graduate School of Education. After getting her master's,
Ms. Foreman taught junior high school for several years, began a doctoral
program in psychology, then took a job as a reporter for the Lowell Sun
in Lowell, Mass.
After moving to the Globe,
she wrote for the Living section, then enjoyed a stint as a guest reporter
at The Times of London for six months in 1982. After becoming a science
and medical writer, she won a Knight Science Journalism Fellowship at the
Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1989-1990.
She now writes two columns
for the Globe's "Health & Science" section, one called
"Aging" and the other, "Health Sense," which offer reader-friendly,
practical medical advice for consumers.
She has won numerous national
journalism awards, including the Clarion Award and honors from groups such
as the American Society on Aging, the National Women's Political Caucus, the
American Heart Association, the Arthritis Foundation, the Associated Press
Sports Editors among others.
For pleasure, she sings
alto in the Boston's Back Bay Chorale, bikes and travels extensively with
her husband.
NATIONAL
LEVEL
TRUDY LIEBERMAN
Consumer Reports
New York, New York
Ms.
Lieberman is the recipient of this year's National Media Award for her three-part
series, "When A Loved One Needs Care," that covered the totality
of the nursing home experience and other aspects of long-term care. For her
report, Ms. Lieberman visited 53 nursing homes and 27 assisted living facilities
and put herself in the shoes of someone actually looking for care. Part 1
presented ranking of nursing home chains based upon inspection reports from
the Health Care Financing Administration. Part 2 examined the funding system
for long-term care. Part 3 provided an in-depth look at assisted living facilities.
The report was widely used in the debate on Medicaid block grants and showed
how regulations already poorly enforced were likely to disappear.
Trudy Lieberman is a senior
investigative editor of Consumer Reports, specializing in economic
and financial reports. Recently she has concentrated her reporting on insurance,
healthcare financing, and health coverage for the elderly. Many of these reports
have had wide national impact, attracting the attention of policymakers, academics
and the media.
She has won two National
Magazine Awards, the Oscars of magazine publishing, and several other national
awards. In 1993, Ms. Lieberman received a Fulbright Senior Scholar Award to
study healthcare in Japan and a John J. McCloy Fellowship to study healthcare
in Germany.
She is the co-author of
How to Plan for a Secure Retirement published in 1992, and the author
of Family Finance Workbook (1989), and Life Insurance: How to Buy
the Right Policy from the Right Company at the Right Time (1988). She
is also a contributing editor for Columbia Journalism Review and an adjunct
instructor in journalism at the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.
She serves on the board
of directors of the National Committee for Quality Assurance, an organization
that accredits health maintenance organizations. She has served on the National
Association of Insurance Commissioners' (NAIC) Advisory Committee on Long-Term
Care, and has written NAIC's pamphlet "A Shopper's Guide to Long-Term
Care Insurance." She is a member of the Advisory Council for Health Beat
sponsored by the Radio and Television News Directors Foundation.
Trudy Lieberman holds
a bachelor of science degree with distinction from the University of Nebraska
and a certificate in economics and business journalism from Columbia University
Graduate School of Journalism.
Honorable
Mention
Wendy Schmelzer
National Public Radio
Santa
Monica, California
An Honorable Mention is
awarded to Ms. Schmelzer for her coverage of aging issues for NPR's Science
Unit. Among her stories this year, six are particularly highlighted. They
are: Assisted Living (two parts), Volunteers, Medicare at Home, WWII Veterans,
Sleep Changes with Age, and the Birthday Girls. The series gives voice to
real concerns of the nation's elders. In addition, she explores issues of
growing old with sensitivity and perspective. Her stories are accurate, balanced,
thoughtful and thorough, including not only what experts have to say but also
what is said by older adults. With a national audience, Ms. Schmelzer is expanding
the awareness, sensitivity and knowledge of a nation of listeners to the concerns
of an aging America.
LOCAL/REGIONAL
LEVEL
LUCY MORGAN
St. Petersburg Times
Tallahassee,
Florida
Lucy
Morgan is this year's winner of the ASA Local/Regional Media Award. "What
Price Dignity?" started as a first-person account of the struggles of
Ms. Morgan to examine her own experience with her mother's end of life. Handling
a first-person experience extraordinarily well, she presented the reader with
a powerful, poignant story that captured the broader issues. She put a face
on the problem, never slipping into ageist stereotypes. It grew into a series
that examined the current state of living wills, advance directives and nursing
home regulations, pointing out strengths and flaws. Generating a flood of
responses and 300 participants at a follow-up free public forum on living
wills, healthcare surrogates, and other end of life issues, the series also
struck a responsive chord with U.S. Rep. Sam Gibbons, ranking Democrat on
the House Ways and Means Committee who won approval of an amendment requiring
Medicare trust-fund money be set aside for creating an inspector general's
field office in every state to monitor expenditures and document abuse.
She has been a reporter
with the Times since 1968. In 1973, she was sentenced to eight months
in jail for refusing to reveal a source. In 1976, the Florida Supreme Court
overturned the sentence and granted reporters a limited right to protect sources.
Her previous awards include
the 1985 Pulitzer in Investigative Reporting and the 1982 runner-up for the
Pulitzer in Local Reporting. She has been Capital Bureau Chief since 1986,
Associate Editor since 1993 and a member of the Board of Directors of the
Times Publishing Company since 1991. The board governs the operations of The
Times, Congressional Quarterly, Florida Trend and Governing magazines.
Honorable
Mention
Bernard Starr, PhD
WEVD-AM
New York, New
York
An Honorable Mention is
awarded to Bernard Starr for his coverage of a large range of aging issues
for WEVD-AM serving metropolitan New York. Unique in commercial radio, his
broadcasts are thought-provoking and encourage listeners to reflect on issues
and ideas that they would not otherwise be exposed to. Called the "Longevity
Report," the presentations cover a wide range of aging topics that call
attention to the need for overall planning for an aging society and the longevity
revolution and emphasize the need for initiatives in healthcare reform, long-term
care policy, homecare, intergenerational issues, and quality of life. Forty-two
reports were broadcast in fiscal year 1996.
Bernard Starr is a psychologist,
college professor, talk radio host and writer who specializes in adult development
and East-West psychology. He is founder and editor of a number of publications
about adulthood: The Springer Publishing Co. Series on Adulthood and Aging,
The Springer Series on Lifestyles and Issues in Aging, and The Annual
Review of Gerontology and Geriatrics. Dr. Starr's other writing credits
include a lifespan text (Human Development and Behavior: Psychology in
Nursing), a popular book on sexuality in later life (The Starr-Weiner
Report on Sex and Sexuality in the Mature Years --- hardcover by Stein
and Day, paperback by McGraw Hill, and a book on infidelity in America, Stalemates:
The Truth about Extra-Marital Affairs (New Horizon).
Dr. Starr has made many
media appearances and has been featured on shows with Phil Donahue, Joan Lunden,
Regis Philbin and others (complete list of media appearances available on
request). Dr. Starr was professor of educational psychology at the City University
of New York for 25 years, and currently teaches at Marymount Manhattan College
where he directs the Gerontology Certificate Program, and teaches "The
Spiritual Forum" in a program for people aged 50-plus (co-leader of the
forum is Richard Schiffman, a journalist for National Public Radio). Dr. Starr
is also producing and hosting a series of half-hour programs on the worldwide
longevity revolution on Radio for Peace International, a United Nations-affiliated
radio station broadcasting worldwide from Costa Rica. The first program in
the series was aired in November 1996. Since April 1994, Dr. Starr has been
the writer, producer and host of "The Longevity Report" on WEVD-AM
Radio In New York City.
