The Academy of Achievement brings students face-to-face with extraordinary leaders who have shaped our world. In 1982, Rick Atkinson, a Kansas City Times reporter, and the newsroom team were honored with a Pulitzer Prize for Local Reporting. The same year, he received an individual Pulitzer for National Reporting. Since 1983, he has worked for The Washington Post. His reporting on the 1991 conflict with Iraq resulted in the book Crusade: The Untold Story of the Persian Gulf War. He also received a Pulitzer Prize for Public Service for a series on police shootings in Washington, D.C. Atkinson was an embedded reporter in Iraq, resulting in the book In the Company of Soldiers. He is now at work on a trilogy about World War II. The first book, An Army at Dawn, received the 2003 Pulitzer for History. The second was published in 2007. He is presently writing the third book.