Tuesday, December 27, 2005

BYU first in the Hearst

I just received word that BYU's broadcast program placed first in the Hearst Journalism Competition. The Hearst is the college equivalent of the Pulitzer Prize.

The first-placed overall ranking is based on individual third and fourth place finishes in the radio feature reporting competition and a seventh place finish in the television feature reporting competition. It is the highest overall ranking the school has ever received in the competition. The highest previous individual finish for BYU was in 1996, when Amy Westerby won the television news competition.

Last school year BYU placed second overall, behind Arizona State. That ranking marked a dramatic turn-around for the BYU broadcast program, coming during the first year for our new lab supervisors -- News Director Erin Goff and Production Manager Dale Green -- and the introduction of a new curriculum that abandoned a ten-year experiment in convergence. Along with dramatically higher job placements in 2005, the Hearst ranking recognizes the high quality of our student body and their professional mentors, and provides the faculty a measure of vindication for making the changes.

Our students' radio work airs on KBYU-FM, until recently under the tutelage of news director Joy Shaw (who succeeded Rebecca Cressman last spring). The 30-minute, daily television news broadcast is currently seen live on Provo Cable and can be accessed online.

2 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

Dean Paynter leaving the newsroom is the worst thing that could have happened to that place.

12:36 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

I agree with the previous anonymous poster. It was a HUGE shame. I'm glad I went through the program before that happened.

8:40 PM  

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The opinions stated here are my own and in no way reflect those of Brigham Young University, its students, faculty, or sponsoring institution.