0
0
On May 13, the NS journalism team competed at the Future of Journalism Awards at the University of Utah. The team competed with 1-6A schools, with six students placing 1st or 2nd in their categories. This was the first year that the state competition was not divided into two categories 1A-3A and 4A-6A.
Kipplyn Holbrook took 1st place in Breaking News writing, Madison Shelley took 1st place in News writing, Ellie Finlinson took 1st place in Sports photo, Miley Clawson took 2nd place in Breaking News photo, Jadyn Howlett took 2nd place in News photo, and Rebekah Cox took 2nd place in Feature writing.
At most competitions, there’s a lot of jealousy, resentment and comparison. But journalism strives to be different and create an environment of unity.
“And there [are] two options you can do when you’re not winning,” managing editor Madison Shelley said. “You can be jealous and compare yourself and beat yourself up, or you can look at their faces as they receive that recognition and realize that that is what it’s all about. They are so happy and excited to be recognized for the work that they do, and we can look at the areas that we fell short and take it as inspiration for the next upcoming year and how we can improve as a team.”
One of the main purposes of these awards is to recognize the work high school students do in journalism. For many students at these competitions, it is a full-circle moment to find joy in having their hard work spotlighted.
“I feel like after the end of the year, when everything’s almost done and I get an award or I get recognized for my hard work, it’s just refreshing,” website editor Kipplyn Holbrook said. “That’s like, okay, there is a point.”
Not only are the awards for the kids encouraging, but they provide hope and reassurance for the advisor, especially with only having one division for all schools in the state.
“It was rewarding for me,” advisor Ben Cox said, “to know that our program is as good as these other, larger programs where they have multiple periods where they teach. They have pre-production classes, they have classes to focus on just video and some that focus on just the newspaper— and for us to do everything in the morning before school starts and still be able to win in writing and photography is really rewarding.”
But at the end of the day, the most rewarding thing is not the awards but the people themselves.
“This is a group of kids that you get along with,” Holbrook said. “Even with our differences, there’s so many varieties in this room and we’re all just good friends. ”
Not only do the students find happiness in the value journalism brings, but staff and others can also recognize the importance of the work students do.
Since the current iteration of the journalism state competition began in 2017, the NS Times won best journalism program 1A-3A three times out of seven.
Cox attributes the success of the class to the quality of the people doing the work.
“It’s the students,” Cox said. “I think they’re willing to do hard things. They’re intelligent, they’re capable. And they put their work in, so they’re just really good. They are the best students in the school and it’s a pleasure to work with them.”
