Nondaily
2010 Casey Medals
Winner: "For Their Own Good," Houston Press
Who knew that sheriff’s officials in Harris County, Texas, were placing children as young as 15 in solitary confinement, bereft of counseling, physical activity and education? No one, apparently – not even the judges who sent them there. With dogged reporting and compelling writing, Vogel exposes a justice system that seems to have given up on its most vulnerable. The project prompted outrage and action, among legislators, academics and advocates.
Runner-Up: "Believing the Children," The Austin (Texas) Chronicle
This article features exemplary investigative reporting on a sensitive issue – child sexual abuse – with national implications. There are few feats more demanding than navigating the moral imperatives of protecting the young as well as the innocent, but Smith walks that knife edge masterfully.
Honorable Mention: “The Lost Kids," Phoenix New Times
A searing account of the challenges faced by parents of children with mental illnesses and a juvenile corrections system ill-equipped to help them. Tightly reported and well-written, the stories are an unrelenting call for attention and action on behalf of discarded children.
2009 Casey Medals
Winner: "Long Highland," Long Island Press
This is the epitome of public service journalism. The Long Island Press made a commitment to educating its community about a growing heroin epidemic among young people. The team simultaneously reveals a hidden scourge and a disturbing truth about the community at large. The series exposes wrongdoing and deception by school administrators, who stonewalled the reporters and put their schools’ reputations above student health. Readers see the problem from all angles – through the eyes of kids, parents, schools and cops. The story did what the best stories do: It galvanized an entire community to take action.
Runner-Up: "Who’s Your Daddy?" Dallas Observer
A revealing examination of Texas’ child support system: Many men, mostly poor ones, are forced to pay child support for children they did not father. While Feldman fairly points out the state’s nationwide recognition for enforcing child support laws, she deftly explores the many troubling questions that could have simply gone unasked. Has the state railroaded poor, uneducated men into financial hardship? If Texas receives federal funds based in part on the amount of child support that it collects, is there a budgetary incentive to close these cases? And what happens to the men whose rights are trampled?
Honorable Mention: "To Hug a Porcupine," New Times Broward-Palm Beach
The piece exposes a tragic adoption scenario: In an effort to place three brothers, Florida’s Department of Children and Families concealed the traumatic sexual abuse endured by the boys. The adoptive parents wanted to create a family and make a difference in the world but in the end, it’s their world that is upended. The piece is well-crafted, suspenseful and packed with rich detail. Funcheon weaves classic narrative with superb reporting.
2008 Casey Medals
Winner: "Stolen Youth," Independent Weekly
This is the strain of journalism that elevates the profession: crusading and authoritative, passionate and clearly told. Secret exposes gaping holes in the investigation and prosecution of a 15-year-old robbery suspect, any number of which would undermine judicial fairness. High-impact coverage of an increasingly common story of miscarried justice.
Runner-Up: "Blame It on Becca," Seattle Weekly
A riveting account of what happens when well-intentioned laws designed to prevent truancy hurt the very kids they were designed to protect. Hsu takes a complicated subject and streamlines it through the life of one student.
Honorable Mention: "Faith, Hope...and Charity," Westword
Readers hunger for hopeful stories – this one addresses that longing without sacrificing the sorrowful backdrop that makes a 9-year-old’s optimism in the face of adversity even more inspiring.
Honorable Mention: "You Do the Meth," Westword
An insightful look at the forgotten victims in the drug wars – the children.
2007 Casey Medals
Winner: "Dreams Deferred," The Independent Weekly
The reporter conveys the complexities involving Derrick Steele’s struggles to overcome addictions to find meaningful, legal work through a Durham jobs program. Secret also shows how the program falters through lack of funding and commitment, leaving participants unsteady and on the edge.
Runner-Up: "They Could Be Citizens and They Might Be Deported," Seattle Weekly
Shapiro offers a disturbing glimpse inside a deportation system that rips families apart and treats immigrants – some of whom might be U.S. citizens – as if they were convicted criminals.
Honorable Mention: "Flunk’d," Phoenix New Times
Fenske’s clear-eyed probe of a school devoted to homeless children reveals its failure to provide them with a good education; she constructed a convincing case for closing it.
2006 Casey Medals
Winner: "Polygamy in Arizona," Phoenix New Times
The paper’s commitment to covering -- and uncovering -- the story of how a sect of fundamentalist Mormon polygamists took over a town didn’t just make for compelling reading, it was important work, revealing shockingly widespread sexual abuse, pedophilia and misuse of public funds that had gone on for years. This body of work shows lots of shoe-leather and determination.
Honorable Mention: "Wounded Warriors," East Bay Express (Emeryville, Calif.)
An insightful, unflinching look at a football team in a bleak neighborhood, the story shed light on the challenges the players and the coaches face and captured the difficulty of giving hope to teenagers who need it.
2005 Casey Medals
Winner: "Good Kids, Bad Blood," East Bay Express
This story -- a detailed account of the travails of a 172-pound 10-year-old girl struggling with adult-onset diabetes -- personalizes the pressing issue of childhood obesity. One doctor quoted calls the epidemic of adult-onset diabetes in children "one of the big stories of the millennium," and Gard found a way, by delving deeply and with understanding into a child's life, family situation, diet and daily routine, to capture that sense of importance.
Runner-Up: "Thrown Out," Gambit Weekly (New Orleans)
Reckdahl's dogged reporting turned up this disturbing story about the evictions of public housing residents based on confidential juvenile records.
Honorable Mention: "Head of the Class," Westword (Denver)
In this account of an illegal immigrant who wants to attend college, Thorpe tells a fresh, revealing and insightful story.
2004 Casey Medals
Winner: "Nowhere Boy," Westword (Denver)
The story chronicles the struggle of an adoptive family to obtain mental health services for their severely emotionally troubled son. It touches on funding of the mental-health system, high-risk adoption and the various mental disorders and conditions linked to fetal alcohol syndrome. It’s a compelling subject done nicely.
Honorable Mention: "Worlds of Pain: Why So Many Humboldt Kids Can't Get Dental Care," North Coast Journal (Arcata, Calif.)
Gurnon’s story is an alarming look at one community’s desperate need for dental care, and the needless suffering of low-income children
2002 Casey Medals
Winner: "Louisiana Juvenile Justice," Gambit Weekly (New Orleans)
Reckdahl’s series of strong reports show that the juvenile justice system in Louisiana needs more accountability for how it treats young offenders. Her indefatigable reporting is the series' strength. She uses case histories and numbers in addressing the questions of how best to handle juvenile offenders, and she gives a full and compelling report on the troubled Tallulah Correctional Center for Youth.
Runner-Up: "Who's Caring for the Children?" The Chicago Reporter
This illuminating story showed an unexpected and potentially deleterious result from the state’s welfare-to-work program. Karp explains how things are, how they came to be and keeps returning to the most important consequence — the lack of strong early childhood education for those who most need it.
2001 Casey Medals
Winner: "Chicago Matters: Education Matters," The Chicago Reporter
By mixing compelling human interest stories with old-fashioned muckraking, the Reporter hooked readers, and then outraged them, with this fine series on inner-city schooling. The staff consistently busted cliches and never lost sight of the people at the center of the story: children and families.
2000 Casey Medals
Winner: "Stolen Innocence," The Jewish Week
The author showed great resourcefulness in reporting charges that a highly regarded Orthodox rabbi had harassed or abused teens in his charge for nearly three decades. Rosenblatt showed astonishing fortitude in the face of powerful institutional pressure to keep the story out of the paper. The story illuminated not just the pattern of abuse in this specific case, but also the enormous difficulty ordinary people face when they try to make a case against a powerful and shielded individual. We are reminded that disadvantaged youth include children who are not protected by their parents and the larger community from abusive leaders whom they have been taught to trust.
Honorable Mention: "Teen Suicide: the Silent Epidemic" Education Week
This story will stand as a model on the subject of teen suicide, with very thorough reporting that goes beyond easy stereotypes to bring deep understanding to a complex subject.
Honorable Mention: “Shortchanged,” The Riverfront Times (St. Louis, Mo.)
Year after year, needy children were denied the opportunity to be enrolled in Head Start because of corruption and mismanagement at a government-funded agency. This story put an end to that situation.
about this award
The Casey Medals for Meritorious Journalism recognize exemplary reporting on children and families in the U.S. More than 4,500 journalists have competed for Casey Medals since 1994.