The Izzy Award will celebrate its 17th year this coming spring, and nominations are officially open for work produced during the 2024 calendar year.

The Park Center for Independent Media at Ithaca College (PCIM) will again grant this honor — named after legendary muckraking journalist I. F. “Izzy” Stone — for outstanding achievement in independent media. Each year the award is given to an independent media outlet, individual journalist, or producer who publishes their work with an independent, non-corporate outlet, or their individual platform.

Journalists, academics, and the public at large may submit nominations for the Izzy Award until midnight EST on Friday, January 31, 2025. The winner[s] will be announced next spring, with an award ceremony to follow on April 30, 2025, at Ithaca College.

Please note that work published or broadcast by a mainstream (corporate), commercial, or conglomerated media outlet is not eligible — including if it was produced by a nonprofit/independent journalism organization. However, work produced by a nonprofit/independent journalism organization and published or broadcast by an independent, non-commercial, non-conglomerated media outlet is eligible.

Nominations should include 300-350 words or less explaining why the entry is worthy of consideration. They should include supporting web links (no more than 5) and/or attached materials. Address your submissions to Mickey Huff, Distinguished Director of PCIM, at pcim@ithaca.edu.

Izzy Award recipients are chosen by a panel of independent judges with expertise in independent media. Past winners include Amy Goodman, Naomi Klein, John Carlos Frey, Todd Miller, Laura Flanders, and Sharif Abdel Kouddous as well as independent news sources such as Truthout, Earth Island Journal, and Inside Climate News.

Last year’s award honored to nonprofit news outlet In These Times for economic justice stories that centered workers; journalist Mohammed El-Kurd for powerful reporting from Palestine; Lynzy Billing with New Lines Magazine and Inside Climate News for chronicling the American military’s environmental devastation in Afghanistan; and Trina Reynolds-Tyler and Sarah Conway for their joint investigative series “Missing In Chicago,” which exposed police malpractice. Last year’s Izzy also issued a special recognition for Democracy Now!

We look forward to your nominations and hope you will join us to celebrate excellent independent journalism next spring.