Two Pulitzer Prize winners will speak at the Nebraska Press Women (NPW) Spring Conference on Saturday, April 25, in Lincoln. Both are faculty members at the University of Nebraska College of Journalism and Mass Communications (CoJMC) where daytime sessions will be held.
Chris Graves, who spent 35 years in newspapers, TV and public radio, will tell why she “continues to be energized by the future of local news and how technologies can deliver news to various audiences.” While metro columnist at the Cincinnati Enquirer, Graves was a member of the team awarded the 2018 Pulitzer Prize for Local Reporting for “Seven Days of Heroin.” During her career, Graves also covered a spree killer for the Minneapolis Star-Tribune and helped direct coverage of the George Floyd killing and the COVID-19 pandemic for Minnesota Public Radio.
Matt Waite, who worked for daily newspapers in Arkansas and Florida for 15 years, will address artificial intelligence (AI) best practices and how to make AI work for you. Waite was the principal developer of PolitiFact.com, which in 2009 became the first website to win a Pulitzer Prize. While at the Tampa Bay Times, he received awards for a series of stories he co-authored that exposed state and federal efforts to protect wetlands as being stacked toward developers seeking to destroy them.
Graves and Waite are both graduates of the UNL CoJMC. Graves teaches information gathering, reporting and writing. She also leads the multi-media Global Eyewitness program and is the Deepe Family Chair in Depth Reporting.
Waite teaches courses in reporting, data journalism, sports data analysis and visualization as well as a variety of technology courses involving drones and AI.
With a theme of “Communicating in the New Now,” the conference will also celebrate NPW being “80 Years Bold” by displaying posters, table tents and items of historic significance.
In addition, high school communications contest winners will receive awards and, in the evening, a new inductee will be announced for the Marian Andersen Nebraska Women Journalists Hall of Fame.
A block of rooms is reserved for NPW at Country Inn & Suites, North Hotel and Conference
Center, 5353 N 27th St., Lincoln.