The Dow Jones News Fund presented veteran journalist and educator Loren Ghiglione of Chilmark the 2023 Richard J. Levine Journalism Champion Award at its annual board meeting on Nov. 3.
The Journalism Champion Award was established in 2022 to honor those whose work supports and advances a strong and diverse free press. The award also pays tribute to the late News Fund president and longtime Dow Jones news executive, Richard J. Levine, and his contributions to journalism. Levine, who died in March 2022, was a steadfast champion of the important role of a free press in society, having spent his entire career as a reporter, editor, and manager at the Wall Street Journal and Dow Jones. The recipient of the annual award is selected from a group of nominees by a committee of Dow Jones News Fund staff and board members.
Ghiglione is professor emeritus at Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism, and taught enterprise reporting, global journalism, and media history.
His career includes more than two decades as owner and editor of the Southbridge Evening News, and as president of its parent company, Worcester County Newspapers. During that time, he was elected president of the American Society of Newspaper Editors (ASNE). At ASNE, he pushed for diversity in the news industry, and initiated a study of gays and lesbians in U.S. newsrooms.
Ghiglione, who was a Dow Jones Newspaper Fund intern in 1961, was the 1987 recipient of the Ida B. Wells Award, presented annually to a media executive who has demonstrated a commitment to diversifying the nation’s newsrooms and improving the coverage of people and communities of color.
He led journalism programs at Emory University, the University of Southern California, and at Medill. During his time as dean at Medill, he encouraged diversity in the school’s leadership posts, and in faculty and staff hiring. When he left the position in 2006, more than 20 percent of Medill’s full-time faculty, 50 percent of staff directors, and 35 percent of the entering undergraduate class were persons of color, the school reported. More recently, he introduced an oral history course at Northwestern titled “Native Americans Tell Their Stories,” and served on the school’s Native American Outreach and Inclusion Task Force.
From 2006 to 2007, he served as president of the Association of Schools of Journalism and Mass Communication.
Ghiglione received his bachelor’s degree from Haverford College, a Ph.D. in American civilization from George Washington University, and a master’s degree in urban studies and a law degree from Yale University. Ghiglione was a consultant to the Freedom Forum on its creation of the Newseum, and has authored several books on journalism. He continues to write, producing a regular column for Martha’s Vineyard Magazine.
“Loren Ghiglione’s decades-long commitment to local news and journalism education, as well as his demonstrated values of ethics and diversity, make him an excellent recipient of the Richard J. Levine Journalism Champion Award,” said Dow Jones News Fund President Brent Jones. “His leadership and body of work align perfectly with the News Fund’s early-in-career talent mission, and with Dick Levine’s remarkable record of service and stewardship of high journalistic standards.”
