Walter Cronkite Award 2013 Recipients Announced

The Stone Soup Leadership Institute is pleased to announce the 4th Annual Walter Cronkite Awards.  The Awards Ceremony will be held on Thursday, August 8 from 5-6 p.m. at the Old Whaling Church in Edgartown. 

Walter Cronkite was the honorary chairperson of the Stone Soup Leadership Institute for over a decade. His wisdom and vision of preparing our youth as future leaders gave rise to this Annual Awards Ceremony.  The Awards are presented to those using the power of the media to create positive social change in the world.   This year, our theme is the environment.  In the 1970's Mr. Cronkite was the first to produce a TV series on the environment, winning Emmys for Can the World Be Saved?  Mr. Cronkite was also a life-long champion of environmental programs on Martha's Vineyard.  The 2013 Award Recipients are Bob Nixon and Liz Witham. 

Special Guests at the 2013 Walter Cronkite Awards Ceremony include Steve Mariotti, Founding Director of the Network for Teaching Entrepreneurship. Steve serves in the Institute's International Advisory Council and is featured in the Institute's book, Stone Soup for the World: Life-Changing Stories of Everyday Heroes. In 2002, he won the Institute's Community Hero Award where Walter Cronkite presented Dr. Muhammad Yunus, founder of the Grameen Bank with the Gandhi Award in New York City. Dr. Yunus then won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2006.

At the Awards Ceremony, MVYLI's leader, Mary Ollen will present their vision for a sustainable Vineyard.

The Walter Cronkite Awards Ceremony will be followed by a reception at The Harbor View Hotel. At the Reception, guests will celebrate with Award Recipients, listen to great music with MVYLI Alumni Evan Hall Quintet, and enjoy refreshments from the award-winning chefs at the Harbor View Hotel's Water Street Restaurant. The Reception is a benefit for the Martha's Vineyard Youth Leadership Initiative.

About the 2013 Walter Cronkite Award Recipients

Liz Witham is an emerging filmmaker raised on Martha's Vineyard. She accepts this award on behalf of herself and her filmmaking partner, Ken Wentworth.  Together, they created Film-Truth Productions, a production company dedicated to making documentary films that inspire dialogue and address the social issues of our times in the classroom, workplace, and community.   Their documentary Island Grown Schools - Planting a Seed for the Next Generation has helped to raise awareness and funding for Island Grown Schools, and has inspired schools around the nation to begin their own farm to school programs.  For their documentary currently in production, The Greening of Eden, they're traveling the world to explore humanity's relationship with the earth.  They produce on ongoing documentary series based on Martha's Vineyard called Sustainable Vineyard, which highlights individuals and organizations working towards a sustainable community. Their series and documentary A Home for Us All helped raise over $500,000 for the Island Affordable Housing Fund. Their music-based series DocuTunes.TV utilizes an Internet platform that profiles musicians. For MVYLI's 2013 Job Shadow Day, Liz was a mentor to Shavanae Anderson, the 2012 Walter Cronkite Youth Award Recipient.  

Bob Nixon has spent his life protecting our natural world though film and direct action. The Academy Award Nominee and Emmy Award winner has directed over fifty documentary films in the planets most remote corners and threatened habitats. The goal has often been to carry the message of field biologists and tribal peoples that humankind must make peace with nature or we will destroy the natural systems that support our life on Earth. In 1992 Bob launched the Earth Conservation Corps on the Anacostia River in Washington D.C. with the goal of connecting two of the most threatened resources: our environment and disenfranchised youth.  The program has enabled thousands of youth leaders to engage legions of volunteers generating over one million hours of river restoration.  His innovative work with young people has led to Bob being named A Hero of the Planet by the National Geographic Society, Environmental Educator of the Year by the Chesapeake Bay Foundation and receiving the Presidents Service Award from President Bill Clinton. The work has been featured on broadcasts including 60 Minutes, Now with Bill Moyers, ABC World News Tonight, CBS's Early Show, PBS All Things Considered and publications including The Washington Post, The New York Times and People Magazine.  Current films include Mission Blue that documents the life quest of legendary oceanographer Dr. Sylvia Earle to help the world realize that we are destroying the world's oceans, our life support system.  Recent films include last summer's Discovery Shark Week special The Great White Highway and the Memorial Day Broadcast on the National Geographic Channel of American Heroes Saltwater Challenge directed by Bob and produced by his wife Sarah. The  uniquely close to home effort  documents the fourth year of the "Saltwater Challenge" that  brings recently wounded military from Walter Reed Bethesda Naval Hospital to compete in the Martha's Vineyard Striped Bass and Bluefish Derby. Bob and his wife Sarah helped preserve the Menemsha Harbor by adding the Home Port Restaurant to their two other Up Island Businesses, Beach Plum Inn and the Menemsha Inn & Cottages which hosted theInstitute's 2010 Youth Leadership Summit for Sustainable Development on Martha's Vineyard.

Past Walter Cronkite Award Recipients include Charlayne Hunter-Gault, Len Morris, Josue Cruz and Vineyard youth Christopher Pitt, Meagan McDonough and Shavanae Anderson, Passing the Torch for Amnesty International's 50th Anniversary featuringHarry Belafonte, Dr. Henry Gates and Rose Styron. 

At the Institute's first event, David McCullough's remarked how Mr. Cronkite was an anchor - on TV, as a sailor and for our world.  In 2011, Rose Styron reminded everyone of Mr. Cronkite's wonderful spirit.  Last year, Nick Clooney spoke of his friendship with Mr. Cronkite, at CBS and at his son's Italian villa.

The Reception

The Awards Ceremony is followed by a reception at The Harbor View Hotel hosted by the new owners: Masood Bhatti, David Brush, Drew Conway, Peter Lawson-Johnston III, and Bradley Palmer.  The Invitation Committee features Geraldine Brooks, Beka El-Deiry, Rebecca Conroy, Kim Conway, and Julie Flanders.

At the Reception, guests will celebrate with Award Recipients, listen to great music with MVYLI alumni Evan Hall Quintet, and enjoy refreshments from the award-winning chefs at the Harbor View Hotel's Water Street Restaurant.  Guests will meet members of theMartha's Vineyard Youth Leadership Initiative whose mission is to prepare young people to build a more sustainable world.

The suggested donation is $150. Limited seating: RSVP

http://www.mvyli.org/wca-rsvp

We hope you will join us for the special occasion to honor Mr. Cronkite and  meet Vineyard youth leaders.