Currently in her final year at the Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine (in 2002), Massaquoi won the award for her powerful stories about the impact of Sierra Leone's long-running and brutal civil war on its children. In that war, which was declared to have ended last January, an estimated 200,000 people lost their lives and another two million were displaced.

"I was raised in Sierra Leone," says Massaquoi, "and it is there that I came to appreciate the resilience of the human spirit. Sierra Leone is full of unheard voices, untold stories and unsung heroes whose everyday struggles speak to the depth of human perseverance."

After completing her medical school training, Massaquoi plans to continue integrating writing and medicine as a way to address human suffering and social injustice. In January 2003 she will return to Sierra Leone for more work on collection of fact-based stories about Sierra Leone's children. She will meet with child soldiers, child rebels, orphans, disabled children, internally displaced children, and refugees to gain a sense of the complexity of their experiences.