WKU News

WKU student Gabriel Scarlett won the first photojournalism competition of the 2018-2019 Hearst Journalism Awards Program.

In a recent addition to program guidelines, as the first-place finisher in the Photojournalism I–Features and News Competition, Scarlett qualified for the National Photojournalism Championship in June in San Francisco. Scarlett, a senior from Maumee, Ohio, also received a $3,000 award; WKU’s School of Journalism & Broadcasting received a matching grant.

Michael Blackshire, a senior from Louisville, finished ninth in the competition.

WKU is in first place in the Intercollegiate Photojournalism Competition with the highest accumulated student points from the first of two photo competitions and is followed by University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill: Ball State University; Ohio University; Central Michigan University; University of Iowa; University of Kentucky; Southern Illinois University, Carbondale; Arizona State University; and San Francisco State University. The final Intercollegiate winners will be announced in April.

In 2018, WKU won the Hearst Intercollegiate Photojournalism Competition for the 24^th time in the past 29 years, the Hearst Intercollegiate Multimedia Competition for the seventh straight year and its fourth overall national championship. WKU, which won overall titles in 2000, 2001 and 2005, has finished in the top three overall for nine straight years and in the top eight nationally for 25 straight years.

WKU students have won 15 Hearst individual national championships since 1985 — photojournalism in 1987, 1988, 1991, 1992, 1996, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2008, 2010, 2014 and 2016; multimedia in 2015; writing in 1985; and radio news in 2006.

Often called “The Pulitzers of college journalism,” the Hearst Journalism Awards Program, in its 59th year, consists of five writing, two photojournalism, one radio, two television and four multimedia competitions offering up to $700,000 in scholarships, matching grants and stipends; 104 member universities of the Association of Schools of Journalism and Mass Communication with accredited undergraduate journalism programs are eligible to participate in the Hearst competitions.

The points earned by individual students in the monthly writing, photojournalism, radio, television and multimedia competitions determine each discipline’s Intercollegiate ranking. The winners are those schools with the highest accumulated student points in each category. The overall Intercollegiate winners are the schools with the highest accumulated student points in the writing, photojournalism, broadcast and multimedia competitions.

Contact: School of Journalism & Broadcasting, (270) 745-4144