“The ability to enlist the services and expertise of this very high-quality publication was a wise choice for my company. It certainly bore itself out providing a nice steady stream of referrals for our boutique hotel. I wouldn’t hesitate to use Uken Report for other businesses, thanks to Cindy Uken’s ability to help me write and understand the various market segments that are reached through Uken Report.”
She certainly did that. Most notably, her six-month series exploring the epidemic of suicide in Montana, titled “State of Despair”, provided impetus for federal, state and local leaders to push for action to address this serious health care issue.
She received numerous awards for her series, including first-place in the Awards for Excellence in Health Care Journalism given by the national Association of Health Care Journalists. She also won a Lee Enterprises President’s Award, the top honor given by the parent company of The Gazette. It received several Montana Press Association honors and was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize.
The powerful series highlighted Cindy’s ability to get people to open up to her about their experiences with suicide and mental health issues. She put that journalistic skill to work in other areas of the health beat to deliver comprehensive coverage of that important subject. She was also the lead reporter in The Gazette’s ongoing coverage of the state’s Big Sky Honor Flight program, in which more than 700 World War II veterans were flown to see the WWII Memorial in Washington, D.C. It was an assignment in which Cindy’s reporting writing touched our statewide community in a special way.
Her work helped her win prestigious fellowships, such as her selection as a recipient of the 2013-2014 Rosalynn Carter Fellowship for Mental Health Journalism and the 2012 California Health Journalism Fellowship.
Cindy’s work for The Gazette and its readers did make a difference. I wish her continued success in all her journalistic endeavors.