NOLA Newspaper Wins Award

Congratulations to the hard-working staff of the New Orleans Times-Picayune newspaper for winning a George Polk Award for outstanding journalism. In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, the reporters gave the world a direct window into the immediate needs of the people in the Gulf Coast region who were abandoned by their government. There was no spin and no pulled punches in their coverage.

When the New Orleans' newspaper operations resumed four days after the August 29 storm, its first headline read: "HELP US, PLEASE," the university said. Much of the paper's staff was displaced by flooding, and the paper was forced to publish online when it had no access to its printing presses.

The Polk awards were established in 1949 to honor the CBS correspondent murdered while covering the civil war in Greece in 1948. A committee of jurors, faculty members and alumni of Long Island University selects the winners.

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If you would like to offer your congratulations to the staff, visit this link for a listing of email addresses. This was well-deserved.