A Message from Jon Sawyer

In the late spring of 2019 Jake Silverstein, the editor of The New York Times Magazine, asked me if the Pulitzer Center would consider being the education partner on an extraordinary project then underway—a whole issue of the magazine aimed at reframing how we view the role of slavery in American history. The result, The 1619 Project, is one of the most consequential pieces of journalism ever produced.

We believe that it’s been a landmark in education, too. The conversation with Jake led to a suite of curricular materials created by the Pulitzer Center’s education team, the use of that curriculum in more than 4,500 schools, professional-development workshops for hundreds of teachers, and much-needed debates on the truth of our history in communities all across the country. I’m so pleased that the Times journalist who inspired the project, Nikole Hannah-Jones, was yesterday awarded a Pulitzer Prize.

The Pulitzer Center’s only connection with the Pulitzer Prizes is the link we both share with a family that has championed fearless journalism for more than a century. The Pulitzer Prizes have recognized, since 1917, the best of journalism. The Pulitzer Center, since 2006, has sought to ensure that that sort of journalism survives—and that it engages the broadest possible public via the networks we have built with schools, community colleges, and universities.

We can only do this work with your support. I hope that on this Giving Tuesday Now you’ll consider making a donation. You’ll be helping journalists on great projects like those highlighted below—on the disparate effects of coronavirus on rich and poor communities in St. Louis, on the tragedy of thousands of refugees cast adrift as governments around the world shut down their borders, on the climate disruptions that are rapidly killing the shrimp industry of Mississippi.

Thanks for being a part of our Pulitzer Center community. Congratulations to Nikole—and to all the journalists, educators, and readers who have made this community such a vital force in these challenging times.

Mississippi Today
Climate Change and the End of the Gulf Coast’s Shrimp Industry

Low-cost shrimp from Asia has eroded the Gulf Coast’s shrimp industry for years, but climate change may deliver the killing blow. The Army Corps of Engineers is fighting historic levels of flooding in the Mississippi River by redirecting massive amounts of fresh water into the Mississippi Sound, killing off 56 percent of the shrimp population. Alex Rozier and Eric Shelton report on the dying shrimp industry in a Pulitzer Center-supported Connected Coastlines story for Mississippi Today. “You could’ve dredged the whole Sound at one time, you wouldn’t have caught enough to make a good po’boy,” said one life-long shrimper.

St. Louis Public Radio
Life in St. Louis’ Most Vulnerable Neighborhoods in the Time of Coronavirus

Last week, Richard Weiss and the team at Before Ferguson Beyond Ferguson kicked off the 63106 Project, a Pulitzer Center-supported effort to report on how one of St. Louis’ most vulnerable African American communities is coping with the COVID-19 crisis. In an installment of the series for St. Louis Public Radio, Weiss profiles Kim Daniel, a mother and caregiver whose congenital heart defect puts her at special risk. “If I fall ill,” Daniel said, “there is no one readily available. No one to count on, no one to be at my beck and call, no one to manage my bills.”

In observance of World Press Freedom Day on May 3 and in honor of his friend Kamaran Najm, who was kidnapped covering the war against ISIS, grantee Sebastian Meyer will be donating this week's proceeds from his book Under Every Yard of Sky to the Pulitzer Center. Thank you, Sebastian! You can purchase his book here and read his Pulitzer Center-supported projects here.