Photo: At the press conference in New York at which the creation of the Peabody/Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Awards was announced, it was also announced that Dan Rather would host the Peabody Awards ceremony this spring. From left: Peabody program director Barry Sherman, Dan Rather, UGA President Michael F. Adams, Robert Wood Johnson Foundation President Steven A. Schroeder and Georgia Governor Zell Miller. Photo by Rick O'Quinn.
By Sharron Hannon
The George Foster Peabody Awards program has received funding from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation to create a new award for excellence in health and medical programming by the broadcast and cable industry.
The Peabody Awards, administered for 57 years by the Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communication at the university, recognize distinguished achievement and meritorious service in radio, television and cable. Reflecting excellence and quality rather than popularity or commercial success, the Peabody is considered the most prestigious award in the industry. On average, only about 30 winners are chosen annually from more than 1,000 entries.
Starting with the 1998 awards year, programs honored with a Peabody Award will be eligible for further designation as the recipient of the Peabody/Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Award for Excellence in Health and Medical Programming.
The producers of the program or series selected will receive a $10,000 cash award to develop and produce follow-up programming in the same topic area or to develop and produce new programming consistent with the goals of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation:
"The goal of this fellowship is to enhance the expertise of the award winners and to encourage them to continue to produce programming on medical and health-care subjects," says Peabody Awards Director Barry L. Sherman. "Emory University's School of Medicine and the Medical College of Georgia have expressed willingness to assist in planning and implementation of this fellowship."
The winning program or series will be repackaged and distributed to medical and public-health institutions and to producers, broadcasters and cable-casters, as well as being part of exhibitions of Peabody-winning programs that annually tour leading museums and visual arts centers, including the Media Studies Center and the Museum of Television and Radio in New York, the Museum of Broadcast Communications in Chicago and the American Film Institute in Los Angeles.
The cash award, fellowship and additional distribution of the winning program are made possible by a $481,000 grant from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation to the University of Georgia covering an initial three-year period.
"We hope this award will challenge the fields of radio, television and cable to produce more and better coverage of health and health-care issues," says Dr. Steven A. Schroeder, president of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. "We believe this partnership with the Peabody Awards and the University of Georgia will achieve those goals."
Michael F. Adams, president of the university, adds, "We welcome this partnership with the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and we are grateful for its support of the university's goal of expanding the outreach efforts and influence of the Peabody Awards."
A call for entries for the Peabody/Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Award will be included within the official Peabody entry form, which is mailed each fall to more than 50,000 radio, television and cable executives and program producers worldwide. The Science News Division of the American Medical Association and the Association of Physician Broadcasters also have agreed to assist in disseminating information on this special award program.
The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, based in Princeton, N.J., is the nation's largest philanthropy devoted exclusively to health and health care. It became a national institution in 1972 with receipt of a bequest from the industrialist whose name it bears, and has since made more than $2.6 billion in grants.
