The Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication at Arizona State University is proud to mark World Press Freedom Day by announcing it will take over the administration of the Human Rights Press Awards from 2023 onward. Additional award partners in Asia and around the world will be announced in due course.
The Human Rights Press Awards have a long and distinguished history of recognizing outstanding reporting on human-rights issues. The goal of the Awards is to increase respect for people’s basic rights and to focus attention on threats to those freedoms. It receives hundreds of entries every year, in English and Chinese, from across Asia.
“Recognizing exceptional reporting on human-rights issues is more important today than ever before, due to the many – and growing – threats to press freedom around the world. The Cronkite School is honored to take on the administration of the Awards and we hope to expand their global reach as part of our #CronkiteGlobal initiative,” said Battinto L. Batts, Jr., PhD, dean of the Cronkite School.
The year 2023 will be the 27th anniversary of the Awards, which have been organized by the Foreign Correspondents’ Club (FCC) of Hong Kong since inception.
“I’m thrilled to know that the Cronkite School at Arizona State University is going to pick up the mantle and allow the Human Rights Press Awards to continue into the future,” said FCC Hong Kong President Keith Richburg. “While it sadly has become untenable for the FCC to continue any affiliation or association with the HRPA in Hong Kong, I am proud that for a quarter-century we were able to sponsor the Awards and celebrate courageous, groundbreaking journalism from around Asia.”
The Cronkite School’s Jeffrey Timmermans, PhD, Donald W. Reynolds Endowed Chair Professor, will serve as head of judges for the Awards. Timmermans is a former governor of the Foreign Correspondents’ Club of Hong Kong, and in his previous position at The University of Hong Kong helped administer the 2017 Human Rights Press Awards. Dr. Timmermans directs the Cronkite School’s Donald W. Reynolds National Center for Business Journalism, which works with journalists around the world to improve the quality of coverage of business and the economy.
“We are very grateful to the Foreign Correspondents’ Club for building an incredible platform to honor this important body of work. We feel honored to help ensure the important legacy of the awards continues,” Timmermans said.
A global call for entries will be announced in December, with the winners revealed the following May. There are no fees for submitting nominations.
About the Cronkite School
The Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication at Arizona State University is widely recognized as one of the nation’s premier professional journalism programs and has received international acclaim for its innovative use of the “teaching hospital” model. Rooted in the time-honored values that characterize its namesake — accuracy, responsibility, objectivity, integrity — the school fosters journalistic excellence and ethics in both the classroom and in its 13 professional programs that fully immerse students in the practice of journalism and related fields. Arizona PBS, one of the nation’s largest public television stations, is part of Cronkite, making it the largest media outlet operated by a journalism school in the world. Learn more at cronkite.asu.edu.