| Margaret Kriz, SOC ’80
Photo by Jeff Watts |
When Margie Kriz was a teenager scribbling poems and stories in her room, she never thought her writing would take her from an Alaskan logging camp to a Nevada nuclear waste dump to the halls of Congress. In fact, she didn’t think of writing as a career at all. “I thought it was fun,” she says. “I thought everyone was doing this.” Kriz planned to study environmental science or biology. “Then I hit chemistry,” she says. “Or maybe chemistry hit me.” That’s when it occurred to her that writing might be more than a hobby. She went to AU for a journalism degree, but never lost her love of science, and has long been covering environmental and energy matters for the National Journal. Now Kriz has been awarded one of the most prestigious fellowships in journalism. Kriz is one of this year’s Nieman Fellows at Harvard University, a program that gives accomplished midcareer journalists a year to pursue their academic interests. “I’m trying to use this opportunity to look at energy issues in a much broader way than the narrow focus of Washington,” she says. Having recently written on China, for instance, she’d like to study broad economic growth patterns in Asia and consider the impact they will have on a range of issues, from energy prices to environmental issues to trade and military matters. “I’ll be able to look at things from a big picture perspective that you can’t do on a deadline basis.” Twenty-five years ago, though, she was a cub reporter for the suburban edition of a Chicago paper, fresh from school board and zoning meetings and a bit intimidated by Washington. “AU threw you up to the Hill. You’d cover a hearing, a press conference and have to be on your feet immediately. You really begin to understand how Washington works,” she says. She remembers being startled to see members of Congress waiting for a photographer, making jokes and fluffing each others’ hair. “You’re thinking, ‘Oh my gosh, they’re regular guys.’ You lose the intimidation of, ‘Oh my God! It’s Washington!’” Kriz has been at the National Journal for 18 years. Outside of work, her love for the outdoors often finds her in her sea kayak, while much of her time in the newsroom has been spent on the environmental and energy beat. “People say, ‘Aren’t you tired of these things?’ The thing is, you’re constantly learning. That’s really key to long-term journalism—finding new ways to learn about issues.” —Sally Acharya continued next page top |
