The Acel Moore High School Journalism Workshop has won a national award for efforts in teaching and promoting journalism careers to students of color in the Philadelphia region.

Late last month, a representative from the Dow Jones News Fund announced that the program will be the recipient of the 2018 Robert M. Knight Multicultural Recruitment Award.

This national award, sponsored by the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communications (AEJMC), honors any individual or media organization that has made significant contributions to promoting diversity in scholastic media programs.

Linda Shockley, who wrote the nominating letter, was effusive in her praise of Acel Moore and newsroom staffers who continue his legacy by building and strengthening the workshop he founded almost four decades ago.

Here’s part of Shockley’s letter:

“Acel Moore was a champion for diversity and the people of his native Philadelphia as a dogged Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter, columnist and editorial writer. He used the platform he created and the respect he commanded to launch a program that mentored hundreds of students for more than 40 years.

“As a former recipient of this award and having provided grants to programs that promote journalism careers to students of color, I can say the Moore Workshop is a perfect choice for this honor.

“In the fall of 2007, Moore then a retiree, spent a day at the JEA Multicultural Outreach Academy talking with Philadelphia high school journalism teachers about working effectively with students in a challenging journalism environment. Later, from his wheelchair he worked with the Philadelphia Prime Movers Media Program, a diversity mentoring project for high school journalists, which originated at George Washington University.”

The workshop will be recognized and will receive a plaque and $100 cash prize at the AEJMC annual conference in Washington, D.C., in early August.