Some Questions About AP's Pulitzer Nominee

Some Questions About AP's Pulitzer Nominee

by Eric McErlain

Yesterday the winners of the 2012 Pulitzer Prizes in journalism and the arts were announced. Though it failed to win a Pulitzer, a series by the Associated Press (AP) on safety at American nuclear plants was nominated in the national reporting category. We were a little taken aback by the news considering some of the criticism that was directed at the series by the Columbia Journalism Review earlier this year:
[T]he AP series, while it tackles a critically important public policy issue, suffers from lapses in organization, narrative exposition, and basic material selection, what to leave in and what to leave out. Too much is left to rest on inconclusive he-said-she-said exchanges that end up more confusing than illuminating for readers.