2014 Atlantic Journalism Awards Finalists
Attachments
| Slug/Label | Body of Work |
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| Date Aired or Published | July 14, 18, Nov 5, 2014 |
| Media outlet where first aired or published: | Telegraph-Journal |
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Short explanation of the story and how it developed: Karissa Donkin -- Jim MacNeill New Journalist Award Dear Judges, Atlantic Journalism Awards Please accept this package of stories as the entry for Karissa Donkin of the Telegraph-Journal in the Jim MacNeill New Journalist Award category for the 2014 Atlantic Journalism Awards. If there's a story to uncover, Karissa Donkin will find it. Despite her young age, Karissa is an integral part of the Saint John news team, often called upon for extremely difficult stories. From sensitively covering the funeral of the Grand Manan valedictorian who died in a tragic car accident mere days after graduation, to using right to information requests to hold government -- at all levels -- to account in several stories, Karissa has already shown immense versatility in her reporting career. She filed more than 100 RTI's in 2014 alone. Admittedly, it was challenging to narrow her show of work down to just three pieces. Karissa seamlessly transitions from covering issues of poverty to municipal politics, often in the same day. In a newsroom of dwindling staff, Karissa produces at least two strong stories each and every day she works, while also finding time to file information requests that often lead to innovative investigative pieces and series. In June, she was called on to take on the role of City Hall reporter to fill in for a maternity leave, and she's mastered it in just a few short months. She often scoops the competition and manages to translate political reporting into easily understood and accessible stories. She conscientiously files web hits and full stories in short periods of time, always before deadline. During the provincial election, Karissa was selected to be part of the Telegraph-Journal's election coverage team. She spent four weeks tirelessly reporting from then-premier David Alward's campaign bus. Karissa is the ultimate combination of old-school investigative journalism and the new world order of web. In her series Prescription for Addiction, which detailed how New Brunswick's prescription pill addiction could morph into a heroin epidemic once the province cracks down on prescribing opiates, she helped develop web graphs to help illustrate the story online, in addition to the five-part series developed entirely in three weeks. This time included a two-day trip across the border where she found real-world examples of how heroin affects addicts. We have selected these three works by Karissa to show the scope of her work. Sleep Sweet #9 shows her ability to capture the personal story, the tragic death of a bright high school graduate on Grand Manan. In Prescription for Addiction, she shows investigative depth, the ability to put complex issues in context and present ‘the big picture’. In Cops Commit to OT Reporting’, Karissa shows how quickly she has mastered the difficult City Hall beat at the Telegraph-Journal. Just a few years into a promising career, Karissa is already our ‘go-to’ reporter in the newsroom. We believe she is the epitome of the Jim MacNeill New Journalist Award and proudly put her name forward in this category. Story 1: 'Sleep Sweet #9' New Brunswick Telegraph-Journal Fri Jul 18 2014 Page: A1 Section: Main Byline: Karissa Donkin Telegraph-Journal Danielle Park had a spot on the Mount Allison University women's basketball team, a bright academic future and was valedictorian of her graduating class. But it was all cut short when, a month after graduation, she was killed in a car crash. Her death turned the small, close-knit island upside down. Grand Manan is a three-hour trip by boat and ferry from Saint John. But it was important to cover something that affected the community so much. No other reporters made the trip, and story was written in the front seat of a hot car while in line for the ferry home. Story 2: Skier death a stark warning New Brunswick Telegraph-Journal Mon Jul 14 2014 Page: A1 Section: Main Byline: Karissa Donkin Telegraph-Journal This story was published as part two of a five-part series called Prescription for Addiction. It detailed how New Brunswick's prescription pill addiction could morph into a heroin epidemic once the province cracks down on prescribing opiates. That's exactly what's happened a short drive across the border in states like Maine, and it's turned heroin into a middle-class problem. To better understand how heroin has gotten a foothold in Maine, Karissa and photographer Cindy Wilson drove across the border. There, they met Skip Gates, a father whose son, Will, was an unlikely heroin user. A state champion skier and promising student, Will overdosed from heroin and died one of the first times he experimented with the drug. The story also details how heroin travels from major cities like New York to small-town Vermont, where Will bought it. Story 3: Cops commit to monthly OT reporting New Brunswick Telegraph-Journal Wed Nov 5 2014 Page: B1 Section: City Byline: Karissa Donkin Telegraph-Journal One of three departments to run a deficit in 2014, Karissa wanted to better understand how and why the police department was blowing its budget. She found the overtime budget is consistently surpassed and filed a Right to Information request to find out exactly how much money the police force spends on overtime and where that money goes. She found that taxpayers covered nearly $1 million in overtime in 2014 and several officers racked up high bills - including one officer, who made nearly $50,000 in overtime alone. The story prompted the police commission to force the police chief to publish a monthly report on overtime spending. This story was written in an hour on deadline, and a two-part series detailing how police and fire spend their overtime budgets was written in three days. Sincerely, John Wishart Editor Telegraph-Journal |
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