[lancer1968]

I was referring to mentions beyond the scientific journal community, the first Daily article is the earliest one I am aware of

This highlights the reason for my original question.  Is it "investigative journalism" worthy of one of the highest awards in the journalism industry to publish a news story about a public investigation that's already linked in publicly available sources online?  I'm not in the journalism business so I'm not really in a position to opine.  I was just a little surprised because I would have expected an award of this stature to go to a journalist/publication that uncovered facts that previously were not publicly available.

I was Editor of the Daily 50 years ago (yes 50) when the Daily went independent of the University.  (The University wanted it to protect it from lawsuits and probably alums unhappy with something the Daily wrote.  The Daily wanted it to "feel" like we could publish anything.  We really could have anyway.  In my term, I only got one call from University officials about a subject and it was only a mild complaint that the Daily was a little narrow in its perspective -- and they were righty.)  I have no idea (English major, MBA) if the Daily is correct or not in its article (well beyond my scientific research knowledge), but I really admire the time the reporter has put into the subject and his research (it would have been very, very difficult to find someone who had the time to do all the research when I was Editor) and the guts of the reporter and the Daily to directly challenge the President of the University (independence or not).   I wouldn't be surprised if the award came in part for those reasons.

[lancer1968]

I was referring to mentions beyond the scientific journal community, the first Daily article is the earliest one I am aware of

This highlights the reason for my original question.  Is it "investigative journalism" worthy of one of the highest awards in the journalism industry to publish a news story about a public investigation that's already linked in publicly available sources online?  I'm not in the journalism business so I'm not really in a position to opine.  I was just a little surprised because I would have expected an award of this stature to go to a journalist/publication that uncovered facts that previously were not publicly available.

I was Editor of the Daily 50 years ago (yes 50) when the Daily went independent of the University.  (The University wanted it to protect it from lawsuits and probably alums unhappy with something the Daily wrote.  The Daily wanted it to "feel" like we could publish anything.  We really could have anyway.  In my term, I only got one call from University officials about a subject and it was only a mild complaint that the Daily was a little narrow in its perspective -- and they were righty.)  I have no idea (English major, MBA) if the Daily is correct or not in its article (well beyond my scientific research knowledge), but I really admire the time the reporter has put into the subject and his research (it would have been very, very difficult to find someone who had the time to do all the research when I was Editor) and the guts of the reporter and the Daily to directly challenge the President of the University (independence or not).   I wouldn't be surprised if the award came in part for those reasons.