GENOA – Long-time Kearney Hub reporter and columnist Lori Potter, was named the 2015 Communicator of Achievement (COA) by the Nebraska Press Women (NPW) at its fall conference in Genoa on Oct. 3.
The award is the highest honor NPW can bestow on a member and is based on exceptional achievement in the communications field, service to NPW/NFPW, and service to the community.
In terms of commitment to NPW and the National Federation of Press Women (NFPW) Potter’s record is amazing, noted NPW COA Chair Barb Bierman Batie of Lexington. “She has served twice as NPW’s president, first from 1990-92 and again from 1992-94. She just completed an eight-year term on the NFPW board of directors, which included a term as president from 2012-14 and served this past year as chairman of the NFPW Education Fund. She is currently the NPW treasurer and has served on NPW’s financial committee and in many other board positions.”
A graduate of then Wilcox High School, Potter went on to attend Kearney State College, and upon graduation began a career in community journalism that has taken her to newspapers in Alliance, York and now Kearney.
She is the Hub’s agriculture and natural resources reporter and writes a weekly column, “Potter’s Wheel.” She is an award winning writer and photographer, and has won numerous sweepstakes awards in both the NPW and NFPW Communications Contests, as well as in other organizations, including the Nebraska Press Association and North American Ag Journalists, said Batie.
“It was 20 years ago that Potter first received the COA award. Because of her father’s death at the time of the national convention, she was unable to attend her honors ceremony. While her achievements in 1995 were impressive, in the following decades she has only continued to excel and contribute to her profession, her community and her professional organizations, and we are proud to have her recognized again.
“She a consummate professional, and her dedication to accuracy and clarity in her writing gives readers a better understanding of the challenges, rewards and importance of agriculture and natural resources to this state. She is respected across the board by leaders in the ag and natural resources arena for her professionalism. The people in her community are better informed because she is there,” Batie concluded.
A formal COA application will be submitted to NFPW in May of 2016 with the National Communicator of Achievement to be announced at the NFPW convention in Wichita, Kan., in September of 2016.
