School News

SPH Recognized for Annual Magazine and Free Associations Podcast

The 2023 issue of SPH This Year received several awards from the University & College Designers Association, Council for Advancement and Support of Education (CASE), PRINT Magazine, and the Society of Publication Designers, while Free Associations received Gold from the Anthem Awards.

The 2023 issue of SPH This Year, the School of Public Health’s annual magazine, and Free Associations, a journal club podcast hosted by SPH faculty, both recently earned top awards from communications and creative design experts.

SPH This Year 2023 received three UCDA Design Awards from the University & College Designers Association (UCDA), as well as awards and recognition from PRINT, the Society of Publication Designers, and the Council for the Advancement and Support of Education (CASE). Free Associations received an Anthem Award, presented by The Webby Awards.

Among the UCDA Design Awards, SPH This Year 2023 received a Gold award for cover design, a Silver award for special publication by academic unit, and an Excellence award for editorial spreads. The awards honor the exceptional design and creative work done by communication professionals to promote educational institutions (secondary, vocational, or higher education) and support the exchange of ideas and information relating to the unique role of these creatives. The judges received over 950 entries and awarded 219 awards: 25 Gold Awards, 62 Silver Awards, 132 Awards of Excellence, and 103 Honorable Mentions.

SPH This Year represents a collaboration between the SPH Marketing & Communications team and Boston University’s Creative Services group. The 2023 issue, titled “OUR PEOPLE,” highlights the faculty, staff, and students who bring the school’s core purpose, “Think. Teach. Do. For the health of all.” to life and showcases 2023 as the year the school welcomed its largest cohort of new faculty members. It is the first in a series of magazines that, leading up to SPH’s 50th anniversary in 2026, will each explore a theme core to the school’s history and identity. The 2024 issue of SPH This Year, “OUR PLACE,” will publish this month, followed by “OUR TIME” in 2025 and “OUR FUTURE” in 2026. Last fall, UCDA celebrated SPH This Year 2022 with a Gold Award for cover design, as well as an Award of Excellence for the series of editorial spreads in the magazine.

Free Associations received a Gold Award in the Health category of the 4th Annual Anthem Awards, which recognized a podcast or audio show, episode, or series that raises awareness of health causes. Each year, the Anthem Awards celebrate the purpose and mission-driven work of individuals, companies, and organizations making a difference worldwide, and this year’s award winners were selected from more than 2,300 submissions from 34 countries by the International Academy of Digital Arts & Sciences.

Since 2017, the Free Associations podcast has served as a platform for public health researchers to debate the strengths and limitations of popular new health studies and to train a critical eye on hyperbolic media coverage of scientific breakthroughs in the field. Over the course of more than 150 episodes, hosts Matthew Fox, professor of epidemiology, and Jessica Leibler, associate professor of environmental health, have deftly wielded both humor and skepticism as they have probed study methods and findings, daring to ask whether or not a study’s conclusions are to be believed. Each month, Fox, Leibler, and their guests encourage listeners to join them as they dig into the messy work of asking difficult questions to get at the truth.

In addition to recognition from the UCDA, SPH This Year 2023 also earned first place among annual reports in the 2023 PRINT Awards, was celebrated as a print merit winner by the Society of Publication Designers, and received a Bronze Circle of Excellence Award for its cover design from CASE.

SPH Senior Writer and Editor Jillian McKoy‘s piece “Racism, Sexism, and the Crisis of Black Women’s Health” received the Best of CASE District I Award in the category of writing on research, medicine, and science news. Originally published in Boston University’s alumni magazine, Bostonia, the story in SPH This Year 2023 highlighted the SPH research team that has led the Black Women’s Health Study, the nation’s longest-running study of Black women’s health.