Pulitzer Winner Named Mars Hill University Alumna of the Year

October 12, 2023

Lauryn Higgins, a two-time Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, has been named Mars Hill University’s 2023 Alumna of the Year. She graduated from Mars Hill with a degree in business administration in 2014, and was a member of the women’s track and field team and editor of the yearbook. She went on to earn her master’s degree in journalism at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln in 2018.

Higgins’ work focuses primarily on public health and wellness. She currently works as a freelance journalist, adjunct professor of journalism at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, and as a stringer for the New York Times and the Washington Post. She also writes for NPR, Women’s Health, Shape, Health.com, Teen Vogue, and other outlets.

Her work at the New York Times tracking the COVID-19 pandemic was part of a team that won the 2021 Pulitzer Prize for Public Service, as well as the 2020 Philip Meyer Journalism Award and a 2020 Sigma Delta Chi Award. Her work at the New York Times tracking the Russian invasion of Ukraine was part of a team that won the 2023 Pulitzer Prize in International Reporting.

A native of Winston-Salem, North Carolina, Higgins now resides in Nebraska. In her spare time she enjoys watching college football, gardening, and spending time with her husband, Sam, and their Bernedoodle, Gus.