Star's Allison Cross talks about Emmy win

By Sarah Millar

60 Minutes. Nightline. 48 Hours Mystery.

Those were the programs that Canadian students, including the Toronto Star's own Allison Cross, were up against for the outstanding investigative journalism in a news magazine Emmy.

Yes, an Emmy.

Imagine their surprise when they won.

"It was shocking," Cross says nearly a week after her win. "I'm still in shock. I'm not sure it will ever sink in."

The film was a 20-minute documentary about the global trade of electronic waste. It was done by Cross, along with nine other students and three instructors at the University of British Columbia's school of journalism as part of the school's international journalism course.

The documentary explored how electronic waste (such as old computers, cell phones, televisions etc.) is often disposed of illegally in developing countries, despite Canadian charities and recyclers offering to dispose of the materials safely. Workers in the developing nations often dismantle the electronics by smashing or burning them to access the metals inside and, in the process, poison themselves and the environment. The documentary aired on PBS' Frontline/Word in June 2009.

Cross says the idea came from a professor, Peter Klein. He had seen media coverage of a Chinese village dubbed the "e-waste capital of the world." Instead of the students redoing that story, they expanded on it — visiting other countries where e-waste is dumped, like Ghana and India, as well as China and Hong Kong. Being in a port city where much of the e-waste leaves the country, the students started their documentary in Vancouver, and then followed the products around the world.

While working on their documentary, they also discovered another problem with how e-waste is destroyed — the breach of data security.

"While in Ghana, members of the team purchased used hard drives from an electronics market. On the hard drives we found personal banking information, photographs and security contracts between the American military contractor Northrop Grumman and the U.S. government," Cross explains.

While the documentary may not have changed how e-waste is disposed of, Cross says working on the documentary definitely helped her as a journalist. She says it has given her the confidence to see what she is capable of achieving. It also piqued her interest in international journalism.

"After we finished the project, I went on to spend six months in Sierra Leone working in media development, a month on board a Canadian navy warship on the hunt for pirates off the coast of Yemen."

Winning — or even being nominated — for an Emmy never crossed the students' minds. Klein encouraged them to submit their work for numerous awards, which in and of itself was a lot of work. But, Cross says, she's now glad they did.

The award for outstanding investigative journalism in a news magazine was the first award to be announced, so the group spent the remaining two hours passing around the Emmy and taking photos with it. Then they got to make their phone calls. She texted her parents and brother first, then announced the win on Twitter.

As for what comes next or how to top an Emmy win, Cross isn't sure. 

"I think that’s why Emmys are supposed to come at the end of your career, and not at the beginning."

 

Sarah Millar is a web editor in the Star's one-year intern program. She has worked both in print and online at papers big, the National Post, medium, the Hamilton Spectator and small, the Kincardine News, a community weekly.