VOL. 23, NO. 10	NOVEMBER 21, 1997

Front, from left: 1997-98 Knight-Bagehot fellows Sarah Bachman, Jacalyn Carafagno, Bolaji Ojo, Claire Serant; back, Lawrence Strauss, Karl Taro Greenfeld, Colin Stewart and Michael Molinski and director Terri Thompson.

eslie Wayne, a reporter for The New York Times, has won Columbia's 1997 Best of Knight-Bagehot Business Journalism Award for her reporting on campaign financing. It was presented Oct. 30 at the 22nd anniversary dinner celebration of the Knight-Bagehot Fellowship in Economics and Business Journalism, held at the Sheraton New York in Manhattan.

  The annual award is given by the Graduate School of Journalism for the best story or series written by a former Knight-Bagehot Fellow and published the previous year, July 1 to June 30. Work is judged on business and financial sophistication as well as traditional journalistic skills of thorough reporting, good storytelling and timeliness (including deadline and competitive issues).

  A distinguished panel of business journalists selected a series of articles on political campaign financing that were reported and written by Wayne and appeared September through June, primarily on the front page of The New York Times. In presenting the award, the Knight-Bagehot program's director, Terri Thompson, said, "Working from Washington as part of The New York Times' campaign finance team, Leslie has shown remarkable enterprise and thoroughness in her reporting. She has also shown ways that a Bagehot background can be applied to uncover the business behind politics."

  Wayne was a Knight-Bagehot Fellow during the 1979 academic year. She remained another year at Columbia Business School and was the first Bagehot Fellow to earn an M.B.A. from Columbia. She is the second to receive the Best of Knight-Bagehot honor, which was established last year.

  A mid-career study program, the Bagehot Fellowship was founded in 1975 by the journalism school to address the problem of deficiencies in business news coverage. Originally named in honor of Walter Bagehot (pronounced ba-jet), the 19th century economist and editor of The Economist, it was renamed the Knight-Bagehot Fellowship in 1987 in recognition of the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation's $3 million gift as an endowment for the program.

  As many as ten professional journalists are selected each year to study for two semesters at Columbia's schools of business, law, international affairs and journalism.

  Fellows receive full tuition and a living expenses stipend. During the past 22 years, 187 journalists have participated in this rigorous program, and many now hold key positions in newsrooms around the world.

  The 1997-1998 Knight-Bagehot Fellows, who started their nine months at Columbia in August, are: Sarah L. Bachma, Jacalyn Carfagno, Karl Taro Greenfeld, Michael Molinski, Bolaji Ojo, Claire Serant, Colin Stewar, and Lawrence Strauss.