This past week, we were sorry our senior staff members couldn’t hop on a plane to Atlanta to shep nachas for our having received three awards—our best showing ever—at the American Jewish Press Association’s Simon Rockower Awards presentation (for work done in 2021), part of the AJPA annual conference. These “Jewish Pulitzers” are extremely well-regarded, and winning them serves as encouragement and a strong reminder that we are striving for greatness in each and every story we publish here at The Jewish Link. Whether it’s a story about an annual dinner, a new kosher product, an editorial or a school article, we always seek to do it well.

We also enjoy seeing many of our colleagues and friends in Jewish journalism at the AJPA conference, and were glad that it was finally back in person after two years away. Elizabeth Kratz enjoyed participating in the conference’s editorial planning committee and hopes to continue in that role. But between Moshe’s marrying off his daughter Tamar, Elizabeth sending her daughters off to sleepaway camp for the first time and Jill Kirsch’s upcoming wedding of her son Joey, we just couldn’t make it happen.

However, we were thrilled to learn that Debra Rubin received a first-place award for excellence in news story. Debra is a consummate investigative journalist with an incredible level of professionalism, who works hard on every story she writes. We are very proud to publish her work and bring her stellar writing to our readers on a weekly basis. Debra’s piece, “Avowed Nazi Sympathizer and Military Contractor Charged in Capitol Riot,” was exceptionally researched and provided a unique look at one person who was in the Capitol on January 6, 2021.

We were also delighted that a piece from our first-ever Jewish Link Wine Guide received a second-place award in excellence in writing about food and wine, by our longtime food and spirits writer Gamliel Kronemer. Gamliel’s piece, “The Heat Is On: California Wines in 2020,” was a detailed study of the effects of the 2020 California wildfires and the pandemic on the kosher wine business.

Finally, we are proud that Elizabeth Kratz’s essay, “Grieving, Mourning and Comforting, for Ourselves and for Others,” won a second-place award for the new-in-2022 Rockower category of award for excellence in writing about Jewish thought and life. “This award recognizes a single story or series of articles explaining Jewish ideas and life. Story topics can include Jewish history, theology, philosophy, sociology, or any other related field. Ideally, the story would give those ideas depth and context, either theoretically, as Jewish thought, or as they are lived, as Jewish life.”

We share these awards with our whole fantastic Jewish Link team, and as we continue to welcome and mentor new young journalists, we hope our amazing showing at the 2021 Rockower awards will be just the beginning. Mazel tov!