'Big Ag U' series wins Driehaus award
Investigate Midwest and Harvest Public Media came in first place for the 2022 Richard H. Driehaus Foundation Awards for Investigative Reporting in the small newsroom category.
The three-part series “Big Ag U” was announced as earning the top spot among four finalists on June 21.
“We are so humbled to be recognized for this work among so many other deserving journalists,” said Executive Director Pam Dempsey.
The series enumerated how much money major agricultural corporations had given to four major college ag programs over the years. It also highlighted potentially thorny situations for public universities, which have cultivated powerful agricultural corporations as donors while public funding has stagnated.
Our picks for summer reading
At Investigate Midwest, we cover Big Ag, agriculture and the effect the industry has on the environment, including climate change, and people’s lives. So it makes sense our summer reading list would include these topics. Here is what our staff is reading this summer.
Heartland: A Memoir of Working Hard and Being Broke in the Richest Country on Earth, by Sarah Smarsh
This memoir digs into gender, race and class issues against the backdrop of Smarsh's childhood and growing up in rural Kansas. This is a richly detailed portrait of the Midwestern rural working class.
— Suzanne Behnke, digital editor
The Scientist and the Spy, by Mara Hvinstendahl
The book examines in detail how a Chinese company attempted to steal the proprietary information embedded in Monsanto's seeds, including clandestinely grabbing seed from Monsanto's secret corn fields. It also examines the relationship between giant companies and federal prosecutors when foreign espionage is at play.
— Sky Chadde, managing editor
The Fragile Earth: Writing from The New Yorker on Climate Change, edited by David Remnick and Henry Finder
The book tells the story of climate change by bringing together The New Yorker's most groundbreaking stories from the last three decades. Among them is Bill McKibben's article "The End of Nature," the first to introduce the general public to global warming.
— Mónica Cordero, reporter/Report for America
Miseducation: How Climate Change Is Taught in America, by Katie Worth
Investigative reporter Katie Worth reviewed scores of textbooks, built a 50-state database, and traveled to a dozen communities to talk to children and teachers about what is being taught, and found a red-blue divide in climate education. This is the alarming story of how climate denialism was implanted in millions of school children.
