Announcing the Winners of the 2024 WERT Global and Welles Prizes

The Knight-Bagehot Fellowship in Economics and Business Journalism at Columbia Journalism School announced today that a reporter from The Washington Post has won the 2024 Christopher J. Welles Memorial Prize and that the WERT Global Prize for outstanding business reporting by a woman has been awarded to a reporter for Bloomberg News.

The prizes will be presented tonight at the Knight-Bagehot 49th Anniversary Gala Dinner at the Marriott Marquis in New York City. 

The Welles Prize judges singled out Washington Post corporate accountability reporter Douglas MacMillan, Knight-Bagehot Class of 2016-2017, for his work on “Memory Inc.” The series investigated how more than 2,000 elderly people with memory problems had wandered away from the assisted living facilities that were paid to keep them safe. At least 100 of them died. 

The work, which examined the unregulated $34 billion assisted living industry that is largely controlled by private equity investors and real estate investment trusts, represents investigative reporting at its best, the judges said. "This is a thoroughly written and compelling story, with lots of evidence that private equity ownership has made the world worse - tragically worse - for the sake of profit," said judge Quentin Hardy, Knight-Bagehot Class of 1995. 

The Welles Prize honors the memory of Christopher J. Welles, a former director of the Knight-Bagehot Fellowship and a top business writer known for his penetrating accounts of malfeasance, corruption and corporate collapses. It is given annually to a Knight-Bagehot graduate. 

Knight-Bagehot alumni participating in the Welles Prize selection included Hardy, Principal, LGTM, a communications consultancy. Robert Smith, Class of 2019, Director of the Knight-Bagehot Fellowship; and Leslie Wayne, Knight-Bagehot Class of 1980, a Columbia Journalism School Adjunct Faculty Member. 

Olivia Carville, an investigative reporter at Bloomberg, won the WERT Global Prize for a series of stories that masterfully drove home the many dangers of social media to the mental health and safety of young people. With deep reporting and engaging storytelling, Carville showed readers the devastating – and sometimes deadly – effect that online sexual exploitation, AI-generated deep fakes and addictive algorithms have on teenagers and young adults. 

“Carville's ability to tell these stories through deeply personal tales of affected families and communities was stellar,” said judge Kimberly Johnson. “She was able to deftly weave gripping human emotion into a topic typically discussed through a technical lens. We applaud her work.” 

The WERT Global Prize honors excellence in comprehensively reported business journalism by a woman that fosters a greater understanding of global business. The WERT Global Prize was established in 2018 and is funded by a bequest from the Women’s Economic Round Table and support from the Muriel F. Siebert Foundation and the global management consulting firm McKinsey & Company. 

The WERT Global Prize committee members included Johnson, Deputy Chief News Editor, The Wall Street Journal; Jessica Liebman, Chief People Officer, Business Insider; and Kimi Yoshino, Editor in Chief, The Baltimore Banner. Knight-Bagehot alumni who read entries in the first round of judging included Emma Cosgrove, Emma Court, Layla Jones, Taylor Nakagawa and Lauren Rosenthal of the Class of 2024; and Ryan Kailath, Meghan Morris and Vivienne Nunis of the Class of 2023.

“These stories were riveting and unforgettable,” said Robert Smith, Director of the Knight-Bagehot Fellowship. “They showed us the vulnerability of young people online and older people in assisted living. This is business journalism at its best, and we’re pleased to honor the work of Doug and Olivia.”

The Knight-Bagehot Fellowship offers experienced journalists the opportunity to enhance their understanding and knowledge of business, economics, finance and technology and gain a deep understanding of the business of journalism through a full-time program run by Columbia Journalism School. The fellowship is named for the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation of Miami, which established an endowment for the program, and Walter Bagehot, the 19th­-century editor of The Economist.