The Silurians Press Club scholarship committee awards this year’s $2,000 grant to Anna Oakes to continue her local reporting work. The Silurians, established in 1924, encourage the development of great local reporting work through its scholarships and Excellence in Journalism Awards.
"It's an honor to receive this award from the Silurian Press Club,” said Oakes. “I'm thrilled and grateful to continue my local reporting projects around immigration and refugee resettlement, in Buffalo and New York City, that I started at Columbia Journalism School.”
Oakes spent the last two years focusing on local journalism in New York as a reporter and podcast producer, covering immigration, social movements and healthcare. She covered the student protests at Columbia for outlets including Rolling Stone, The Nation and Univision. For her master's project, she wrote about the challenges of refugee resettlement and the aftermath of New York City's "bussing" program for asylum seekers in Buffalo.
“Oakes won a vigorous competition entered by 35 Columbia Journalism School Graduate students,” said the Silurians Press Club in their announcement. “Her detailed reporting was riveting and insightful.”
Through the Silurian Press Club, she hopes to return to Buffalo to continue her reporting while working as a summer fellow in local accountability journalism at The City.
She is being honored by the Silurians along with other winners from the graduate schools of journalism at New York University and the City University of New York.
