“Good Morning America” anchor Robin Roberts will be the 2014 recipient of the Walter Cronkite Award for Excellence in Journalism.
Roberts will accept the award at a luncheon ceremony on Oct. 6 at the Sheraton Phoenix Downtown Hotel, making her the 31st recipient of the annual award.
“What we look for in the Cronkite Award is someone that is not only a great journalist but someone who can truly inspire our students, and Robin certainly is both of those at the highest level,” said Christopher Callahan, vice provost of the Downtown campus and dean of the Cronkite School.
A communications graduate from Southeastern Louisiana University in 1983, Roberts started her broadcasting journalism career in college at WHMD/WFPR radio in Hammond, Louisiana, as a sports director.
Roberts worked as an ESPN contributor from 1990 to 2005 before joining ABC’s “Good Morning America” as co-anchor.
“I am honored to join the list of others who have won this award, but I’m really excited about spending some time at Arizona State University,” she said on “Good Morning America” earlier this month. “They are the next generation of journalists.”
Roberts was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2007 and myelodysplastic syndrome, a rare bone-marrow disorder, in 2012.
“Life can definitely interrupt your career, but she shows that cancer does not have to affect your life,” journalism sophomore Bailey Netsch said. “Every journalist has passion and the fact that she didn’t let go of that career shows her passion.”
According to a list of previous recipients on the Cronkite School’s website, a print reporter has not received the award since 2005, when Pulitzer Prize-winning Miami Herald humor columnist Dave Barry received the award.
“Honestly, I look at the diversity of recipients not in terms of their platform,” Callahan said. “Especially in these days because I think all good journalists are sort of multi-platform.”
He said that when he first arrived at the Cronkite School, he thought the recipients were overly represented by men. Callahan said that he’s wanted to represent a higher sampling of women receiving the award, especially when two-thirds of Cronkite School students and alumni are women. Roberts is the seventh woman to receive the award.
The first award was presented in 1984 to CBS founder William Paley and former CBS President Frank Stanton. Past recipients include Bob Woodward, Tom Brokaw, Diane Sawyer and Christiane Amanpour.
Over the course of the year, the Walter Cronkite Endowment Board of Trustees discusses who they should nominate as potential recipients of the Cronkite Award, Callahan said. The board chooses a recipient in late spring and then works with the recipient to schedule the Cronkite Award Luncheon. This can be difficult because most of the award recipients are still active in their field.
“Let’s face it, these are folks that get awards all the time,” Callahan said. “You could probably go into their closet at home and open it up and they could have awards flying out.”
Despite the numerous awards recipients may have previously received, Callahan said recipients have told him personally that the Cronkite Award has a special place in their heart.
“These are folks, like myself, who grew up in the Walter Cronkite era,” Callahan said. “He meant so much to these folks that receiving an award in his honor, they look at it very differently.”
Contact the reporter at samantha.incorvaia@asu.edu
