David Ushery, discusses reporting on coronavirus last spring, as New York City became the epicenter of a pandemic. The WNBC team brought viewers vital life and death information about COVID, day after day, in real time. Their reporting won a 2021 duPont-Columbia award. 

In this conversation with duPont Awards Director, Lisa R. Cohen, Ushery recounts the uncertainty of the pandemic’s early days, his team’s commitment to transparently inform viewers, and how WNBC reporters and photographers grappled with the fear of reporting on a highly infectious virus.

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#69: WNBC Anchor David Ushery on Covering Coronavirus from the Epicenter

Radiolab's Jad Abumrad and Shima Oliaee join duPont-Columbia Awards Director Lisa R. Cohen to discuss how they reported "The Flag and the Fury" which won a 2021 duPont award. They explain how what started as an historical audio documentary turned into a breaking news story in the summer of 2020 and the ways they handled that change.

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#71: Radiolab’s Jad Abumrad and OSM's Shima Oliaee on Reporting “The Flag and the Fury”

Earlonne Woods and Nigel Poor are the co-creators and co-hosts of the 2021 duPont Columbia Award-winning podcast Ear Hustle, a unique podcast produced in San Quentin State Prison. In this interview, they recount the origin story of this unlikely project, offer insight on the challenges of reporting inside prison, and share the true definiton of "ear hustling."

#74: Ear Hustle's Earlonne Woods and Nigel Poor

Ed Ou is co-director of the duPont-Columbia award-winning documentary A Different Kind of Force — Policing Mental Illness. Ou joins host Lisa Cohen to talk about the process of creating a nuanced and intimate documentary that tackles two of the most fraught subjects in American life — police violence and mental illness.

#75: Ed Ou, director of A Different Kind of Force — Policing Mental Illness

NPR’s Laura Sullivan reveals the surprising twists and turns behind her 2022 duPont-award winning Planet Money piece, “Waste Land.” Stowed in boxes of old lobbying documents in private family homes, away from public view, Laura finds out that the oil and gas industry knew all along that plastic recycling would never work – a revelation that led her down a winding road of reporting that she details in this first episode of On Assignment’s Season 15.

#76: NPR's Laura Sullivan Talks Trash

“A story is an engine for feelings.”
 - This American Life founder, host and producer Ira Glass

In 2019, This American Life founder, host, and producer Ira Glass gave his special brand of  insight into how he crafts “This American Life,” from story inception, to reporting, writing, and production. We revisit his preeminent editorial style that paved the way for generations of narrative docu-style podcasters.

#81: Revisiting Ira Glass Behind the Scenes at This American Life

“We understood the magnitude of the event fairly early on and the need to start collecting evidence…That's how we think of this. As evidence, not just cover or B-roll.”

— New York Times Visual Investigations Lead Malachy Browne on the January 6 Capitol riots.

“Day of Rage” is the duPont-Columbia award-winning, New York Times visual investigation of the January 6th attack on the U.S. Capitol. Co-director Malachy Browne explains what it was like to organize and dissect thousands of hours of footage from “one of the most documented acts of political violence ever.”

For more, visit https://bit.ly/OADayofRage

#82: Director Malachy Browne on the January 6th “Day of Rage”

“They had told the story of how Tamika died, but not how she lived.”
—Podcast Producer Erika Alexander

“Finding Tamika” is the 2023 duPont-winning Audible series about Tamika Huston, a Black woman who went missing in 2004. The media paid scant attention, and she became a rallying cry for missing Black women and girls. But who was she outside of this tragedy? 

Podcast producer Erika Alexander tells us why finding the real Tamika behind the crime statistic is so important, and how journalists need to do a better job of telling these stories.

#86: Erika Alexander on Finding Tamika

“We all understand just how easily history is forgotten. And this history is being actively destroyed.” 
–Podcast Host Connie Walker

“Stolen: Surviving St. Michael’s” is a 2023 duPont-winning series that uncovers the horrific abuse many young indigenous children–including the reporter’s own family–faced at a Canadian residential school.

Host and investigative journalist Connie Walker talks about the ethics of making public long buried stories of sexual abuse, highlighting indigenous voices and her own personal stake in this impactful podcast.

#87: "Stolen's" Connie Walker on Her Personal Story with a Nationwide Reach

“I respect the Boy Scouts. I respect what they were founded on. But there was a really dark side and no one was talking about it.”
                                                                           –"Leave No Trace" Director Irene Taylor

“Leave No Trace” is a 2023 duPont-Columbia Award winning documentary that exposes the stunning history of sexual abuse faced by over 80,000 young men and its subsequent cover up by The Boy Scouts of America. The film highlights the voices of six men and boys, who bravely share their stories, and hold power to account. 

Director, Irene Taylor, talks about the relentless way her team took on an “All-American” institution and the sensitive way they approached its survivors.

#88: “Leave No Trace” Director Irene Taylor on the Boy Scouts’ Hidden History

#89: The New Yorker's Masha Gessen with Dean Jelani Cobb

“The incentive structures in the worlds of politics and news media… are geared towards division and not just division, but demonizing people.  And it's very dangerous. It has already resulted in loss of life."
-CNN’s Jake Tapper

Jake Tapper is the CNN Chief Washington Correspondent, anchor of The Lead with Jake Tapper, and co-host of the Sunday morning public affairs program State of the Union. In 2023, he was part of the team that won a duPont-Columbia award for their coverage of the conflict in Ukraine. He also hosted the awards at Columbia University in 2018.

In this episode, Tapper sits down with Columbia Journalism School’s Dean Jelani Cobb to discuss the extraordinary state of American politics how journalists should report on figures like Trump.

#90 CNN's Jake Tapper with Dean Jelani Cobb

“These were just ordinary women turned outlaws.” - Director Tia Lessin

Directors of the 2023 DuPont award-winning film ‘The Janes’, Emma Pildes and Tia Lessin join journalist and J School Adjunct Professor Jessica Bruder for a lively conversation about their film that deep dives into an historic underground service for women seeking safe, affordable, illegal abortions, in the 60s and 70s.

#91 “The Janes” Doc Directors on Its Relevance Today

“We have all these new media forms. But we haven't really found one that does what the old school news magazine still do well, which is sit across from someone and look them in the eye and turn TV into a lie detector.“ 
--HBO Real Sports’ Correspondent David Scott 

Multiple duPont Award-winning journalist David Scott invited Prizes’  Executive Director Abi Wright and duPont Director Lisa R. Cohen to his HBO Real Sports office back in 2018, following their win for a special investigative hour on the Olympics. We’re revisiting this interview to commemorate the end of an era. For 29 seasons Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel has looked at sports from the complex lens of power, culture, and human rights. This month marks its last episode.

In the 2018 episode Scott goes behind the scenes of some of his celebrated reporting - in “The Lords of the Rings,” and his duPont winning coverage of controversies around China’s Olympic games, and in a harrowing trip to Chechnya to interview its repressive leader Ramzan Kadyrov. Scott offers practical tips on how to take on powerful subjects, how to safeguard your footage in dangerous locations and how to evade government “minders” seeking to keep reporters away from the real story. 

Watch “The Strongman” David Scott’s report on Chechnyan MMA fighters and leader Ramzan Kadyrov. 

Watch the last episode of HBO Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel on December 19.

#92 Revisiting HBO Real Sports’ David Scott as an Era Comes to an End

“If we're not looking at these issues and understanding them for what they actually are - not just what we hope they are -  I don't see much of a bright future, for my kids or anybody else's.”
—Evan Simon, ABC News Producer

Ever wonder if your plastic really gets recycled when you throw it in that bin? Lisa Cohen and Abi Wright speak to ABC News’ Chief National Correspondent Matt Gutman, and his producing team to hear how they tracked their own plastic bags, with surprising results.

#93 Correspondent Matt Gutman and His ABC News Producing Team on Tracking Trash

“I don't want to have my chain yanked. I do not want to report on things  in the news because a bad faith actor is driving me to do that. I do not play requests.’” – Rachel Maddow

2020 duPont-Columbia Award winner and MSNBC host Rachel Maddow talks to Dean Jelani Cobb about the urgency of reporting on the 2024 Presidential election. She also shares advice to young journalists and her take on the state of journalism in this unprecedented political season.

#94: MSNBC's Rachel Maddow & Dean Jelani Cobb on Covering American Politics

Phil Williams, titan of local journalism, five-time duPont-Columbia Award winner and dubbed “Nashville’s Nosiest Bitch” - by satirist John Oliver - talks about his most recent duPont Award-winning investigation, Hate Comes to Main Street. In the series, Williams squares off with local right-wing politicians and white supremacists to expose how conspiracy theories are shaping political life in Tennessee.

#95: Local Hero Phil Williams

Author and journalist Alice Driver remembers her first time meeting people from other countries as a child in rural Arkansas – they were all workers at meatpacking facilities. Her book, “Life and Death of The American Worker: The Immigrants Taking on America’s Largest Meatpacking Company,” which won the $25,000 J. Anthony Lukas Work-in-Progress Prize, focuses on the struggles those immigrant workers face today – specifically those employed by Tyson, America’s largest meatpacking company. 

In this episode, Alice Driver joins the J School Prizes Department’s Abi Wright and Lisa Cohen to talk about her award-winning book, the impact it’s had on migrant workers and the meat industry, and how young journalists can keep their momentum going if they decide to tackle longform projects of their own.  She urges 

Read more about “Life and Death of The American Worker,” and Driver’s other books, here. 

Do you, or someone you know, have a non-fiction work-in-progress that is currently under a book contract? If so, enter to win the J. Anthony Lukas Work-in-Progress Prize - or other Lukas Book Prizes - before the Dec. 4, 2025 deadline. Go to https://journalism.columbia.edu/lukas for more information and to enter.

#96: Alice Driver on Her Lukas Prize-Winning Book

New York Times' Paris Bureau Chief Alissa J. Rubin talks to former New York Times Executive Editor Jill Abramson about covering war-torn countries, the helicopter crash that left her severely injured and reporting on the Paris terror attacks.

#1: Alissa J. Rubin and Jill Abramson

In this episode, Spotlight comes to the J-School. Meet the Boston Globe reporters who unveiled a major sexual abuse scandal within the ranks of the Catholic Church. Editor Walter “Robby” Robinson and reporter Sacha Pfieffer discuss taking on the highest of power, how their Pulitzer Prize-winning stories inspired the film Spotlight - the big winner at this year’s Academy Awards, and what it felt like in the audience when the Oscar was announced.

#4: Sacha Pfeiffer and Walter Robinson

Listen in on a conversation with the journalists behind the worldwide phenomenon Serial: Host and Executive Producer Sarah Koenig, Executive Producer Julie Snyder and Producer Dana Chivvis. Serial won a 2016 duPont-Columbia Award, and has been downloaded over 200 million times.


#5: Sarah Koenig, Julie Snyder and Dana Chivvis

This year’s duPont-Columbia Awards celebrated our 75th anniversary in a room packed with journalism greats like NBC News’ Lester Holt, CBS News’ Jane Pauley, This American Life’s Ira Glass, CNN’s Christiane Amanpour, Bill Moyers, Charlayne Hunter-Gault, and so many others. Holt kicked off the evening by addressing the current anti-media climate head-on. Throughout the ceremony, award winners and honorees echoed his sentiments, reaffirming just how critical journalism is, now more than ever. 

See the complete list of this year’s winners here. Watch the full ceremony and learn more about the duPont-Columbia Awards at duPont.org. #duPont2017

#17: Ira Glass, Christiane Amanpour and Bill Moyers

Director Ezra Edelman had no desire to rehash the OJ Simpson story. Here's why he made an 8-hour film about it.  A conversation with Edelman on his 2017 Oscar and duPont-Columbia Awards winning film OJ: Made in America. Edelman spoke with Professor Betsy West after a screening of part one of the film at Columbia Journalism School's Film Fridays.

#21: Ezra Edelman

For our Summer Series, we’re catching up with this past year’s 75th Anniversary duPont winners. In this episode, Abi and Lisa speak to Daniel Zwerdling, NPR journalist extraordinaire, who has spent years reporting on veterans’ rights. We hear about how  journalism is a lot like studying Psychology, his best interview techniques, and how he balances day-to-day stories with the longer investigations he builds over years.

#22: Danny Zwerdling

NBC Anchor and Correspondent Kate Snow, who won a 2017 duPont award for her Dateline NBC report, “The Cosby Accusers Speak,” talks with On Assignment about her experience reporting on 27 of the women who accused Bill Cosby of sexual harassment and assault.

#25: Kate Snow

A candid conversation with director James Bluemel and his fearless subject Hassan Akkad about their film Exodus. The 2018 duPont-Columbia Award winning documentary captures the extraordinary journeys of refugees fleeing to Europe, using their first hand stories and footage.

#33: James Bluemel and Hassan Akkad

Zoe Chace of This American Life and Michael Barbaro of The Daily speak about the rewards and challenges of making stories for audio, the "tyranny of the good talker," and the sense of intimacy that comes from the voice alone.

#35: Michael Barbaro and Zoe Chace

2019 duPont-Columbia winner Alexandra Shiva talks navigating language and cultural barriers to make a humorous and important film about refugees that transcends party lines.

#47: Alexandra Shiva

Revisit Nikole Hannah-Jones, NYT Magazine writer and creator of the 1619 Project, in conversation with NBC News anchor Lester Holt about reporting on race and takeaways from her 2018 John Chancellor Award-winning reporting.

#51: Revisiting Nikole Hannah Jones with Lester Holt

WKBW's Charlie Specht talks with Professor Nina Alvarez about a reporting journey that took many unexpected turns: from covert emails sent anonymously from inside the church, to parking lot meetings, from undercover recordings to Specht’s own conflicted personal ties as a devout Catholic.

#59: Charlie Specht

In this episode of On Assignment, CBS News 60 Minutes producers Michael Rey and Oriana Zill de Granados go behind the scenes of their duPont-winning reports on the US-Mexico Border. They describe basement meetings, months of back-and-forth with government sources, and having a U.S. president criticize their reporting. They also talk about how they have adapted to producing television news remotely in the time of COID-19.

#62: Michael Rey and Oriana Zill de Granados

In our latest episode, Rachel Maddow and Michael Yarvitz discuss their duPont Award-winning podcast, Bag Man, which details the brazen wrongdoing of Richard Nixon’s Vice President, Spiro T. Agnew -- and why so many have forgotten about him altogether.

#66: Rachel Maddow and Michael Yarvitz on their 2020 duPont Award-Winning Podcast, Bag Man

On Assignment brings you some of the best conversations from the Columbia Journalism School, produced and hosted by the school's Alfred I. duPont-Columbia University Awards.

The duPont-Columbia Awards honor the best in audio-visual reporting across platforms including broadcast, documentary, local investigative, radio and interactive journalism. We started the On Assignment Podcast to go behind the scenes and bring you the conversations we were having with the leading journalists in the field, many of whom are also past duPont Award winners.

On Assignment - From the duPont-Columbia Awards

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