The winner of the 2013 Evert Clark/Seth Payne Award, an annual prize for young science journalists, is Megan Scudellari.
Scudellari received the award and its $1,000 prize for “Never Say Die,” a story about aging and life extension in MATTER, a Kickstarter-funded online magazine; for an article in The Scientist about prosthetic limbs, “Missing Touch;” and for two shorter pieces, “Under the Hood of the Ultimate Brain Hacking Machine” in Discover and “Women suffer from brain injuries, too” in DoubleXScience.
The panel of judges cited Scudellari for her compelling storytelling, broad range of topics, accurate science and ability to tailor her style to different audiences.
The judges also awarded an Honorable Mention to Azeen Ghorayshi for a story on earthquake warning, “Sounding the Alarm,” in the East Bay Express. Ghorayshi not only clearly tackled a difficult scientific topic, the judges said, she also put the science in the larger social and political context, explaining why Japan’s earthquake warning system is better than the U.S.’s.
The award will be presented by the Evert Clark Fund and the National Association of Science Writers, in conjunction with the National Press Foundation. The ceremony typically takes place during the annual meeting of the National Association of Science Writers and the Council for the Advancement of Science Writing. This year the meeting will be in Gainesville, Florida, November 1-5.
Judges for the 2013 award were Susan Milius, life sciences writer at Science News; David Lindley, author of Uncertainty: Einstein, Heisenberg, Bohr, and the Struggle for the Soul of Science and other books about physics; Steve Wildstrom, formerly BusinesssWeek's Technology & You columnist and co-founder of Techpinions.com; Jeffrey Mervis, deputy news editor at Science; and Laura Helmuth, science and health editor at Slate.
The Clark/Payne Award encourages young science writers by recognizing outstanding reporting in all fields of science. It is given each year in memory of journalists Ev Clark and Seth Payne, who offered friendship and advice to a generation of young reporters. This is the 24th year of the award.
All entrants must be age 30 or younger. The deadline for submissions is now the end of June each year. For more information, contact the Evert Clark Award Fund or the Evert Clark website.
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