The Goldsmith Prize for Investigative Reporting
About the award
The annual Goldsmith Prize for Investigative Reporting honors investigative reporting that best promotes more effective and ethical conduct of government, the making of public policy, or the practice of politics. The winner receives $25,000, and five finalists receive $10,000. Prize money is paid directly to the journalists, not the news organizations. While the subject can address issues of foreign policy, a submission qualifies only if it has an impact on public policy in the United States at the national, regional or local level.
Financial support for the Goldsmith Awards Program is provided by an annual grant from the Goldsmith Fund of the Greenfield Foundation. The program is administered by the Shorenstein Center on Media, Politics and Public Policy at Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government.
The nominations portal includes submission forms for both the Investigative Reporting prize and the Explanatory Reporting prize. Instructions are below:
- Submitters must create an account by clicking “new account” below the gold “Login” button. One account per person.
- Enter the name and email address you would like to use for this account.
- The portal page will refresh and an email with the subject line “Verify your new account in Goldsmith Awards” will be automatically sent to you.
- Enter the verification code into the portal.
- You will then be prompted to create a new password.
- Once you have entered your new password you’re in!
- This account is where you will log in, review criteria, and submit your nominations. You will be able to save your progress and come back to the nominations form as you work on it, if you need to.
- You may only save ONE draft nomination form for each prize (one for the Explanatory prize and one for the Investigative prize) at a time. We recommend you draft materials outside of the portal, and then enter each submission separately.
- If you have any trouble copy/pasting content into the form fields, please clear your browser’s history. Browser caching occasionally interferes with the form functionality.
Criteria and Rules
Criteria
The annual Goldsmith Prize for Investigative Reporting honors investigative reporting that best promotes more effective and ethical conduct of government, the making of public policy, or the practice of politics. The winner receives $25,000, and five finalists receive $10,000. While the subject can address issues of foreign policy, a submission qualifies only if it has an impact on public policy in the United States at the national, regional or local level. Entries from small and mid-size publications and comparable broadcast/online outlets are encouraged.
Eligibility
- Submissions will be accepted only from the U.S. news media. Newspapers, magazines, broadcast media, radio, podcasts, and online news organizations are eligible.
- Original broadcast or publication must have occurred between January 1, 2024 – December 31, 2024.
- No more than TWO entries may be submitted by a news organization. If entries were produced in collaboration with another news organization, the lead news organization must submit the entry and list any secondary partner organizations/collaborators. If your organization is listed as a secondary partner/collaborator in an entry submitted by another news organization this does not count towards your two allowed entries.
- Books will not be accepted as submissions for this prize.
How to Apply
- The deadline for submissions for the 2025 Goldsmith Prize for Investigative Reporting Thursday, January 9, 2025 at 11:59 p.m. ET.
- Each submission must include a one-sentence summary of the entry, a brief description of the actual or potential impact of the investigative report, and a brief description of how the story originated and comment on the reporting process.
- Many entries include a series of articles on a particular topic. Please limit your submission to no more than 5 installments. Any supplemental sidebars and interactive or multimedia features do not count as installments and are permitted.
- The credited authors, titles of work and all other information must be finalized and accurate at time of submission, as this information will be used in a press release if your entry is selected as a finalist.
- Any corrections or clarifications added to the story after its initial publication must be clearly identified and explained.
- Material must be submitted as a live URL and printer-friendly PDF:
- URL: Applicants are responsible for making sure the URL works outside of their organization. If entry content is behind a paywall applicants must ensure judges are able to view it (e.g. by providing login details or creating private URL). URLs must remain active during the contest period. If entry includes multiple articles/installments, please (where possible) include URL of single landing page/index/playlist with access to all articles/installments.
- PDF: Please combine all installments into a single printer-friendly PDF. Text material (newspaper, magazine, online news organizations) must be formatted in one column. Broadcast/video/audio submissions must include a PDF of the transcript. [You can find an example of a correctly formatted PDF here]
- There is no entry fee.
- Applications must be submitted online. Paper entries will not be accepted.
Prize Money
The winning entry receives $25,000, and five finalist entries receive $10,000 each. Prize money is paid directly to credited authors of the winning/nominated entries, not their organizations.
Submission Info
Submissions for the 2025 Goldsmith Prize for Investigative Reporting are now open! The deadline for submissions is Thursday, January 9, 2025, 11:59 pm ET.
Questions
Please contact Lindsay Underwood at the Shorenstein Center: lindsayunderwood@hks.harvard.edu