Five students to participate in Hearst national finals
IU finished first overall and will send an unprecedented five journalism students from The Media School to the national finals of the 55th annual William Randolph Hearst Foundation’s Journalism Awards Program’s writing competition in June, the organization announced today.
Junior Megan Jula sealed the win by earning first place in the breaking news category for her story, “Woman sentenced to 20 years for aborting and discarding baby,” which was published in the Indiana Daily Student in March.
Her achievement added to IU’s overall score, which combines all points earned by student entrants in each of five monthly writing competitions. IU took the top spot for the second year in a row, with Arizona State in second, North Carolina in third, Northwestern in fourth and Nebraska in fifth.
“Indiana University’s success in this year’s Hearst competition is testimony to the tremendous talent and drive of our students, and the commitment of the faculty who work with them so carefully,” said James Shanahan, dean of The Media School. “Our school fosters a commitment to writing for all of our students. The results from this year’s competition show the breadth and depth of our success in that endeavor.”
In the writing competition, students submit their previously published work in categories such as breaking news, personality/profile or sports writing. First place winners automatically earn an invitation to finals; the other three spots usually go to students who have amassed the most points but did not place first.
Jula will be joined at the national competition June 1-5 by sophomore Hannah Fleace, who won first place in the personality/profile, and junior Samantha Schmidt, who won first place in the enterprise reporting category. Junior Evan Hoopfer, who won second place in sports writing, and senior Michael Majchrowicz, who was third in personality/profile, amassed enough points to earn two of the three wildcard spots.
Students also win scholarships from the foundation, and schools receive matching grants. Jula and other first place winners earned $2,600, those in second through fifth place earned lesser amounts and lower-placing participants received certificates.
At the national finals, students receive reporting assignments and have only a day or two to prepare for interviews and conduct on-the-ground reporting in San Francisco.
IU sent four students to the finals last year, including Majchrowicz and Jula, who also won the breaking news category in 2014. This is the first time IU has sent five students.
“The championship is a thrilling and nerve wracking experience, but being familiar with how it works will help me to produce my best work,” Jula said. “However, this year it’s also a whole new city and a new set of stories. I’m not sure any experience can truly prepare a reporter for this kind of competition. In a contest like this, you don’t have control of anything other than your writing.”
Professor of practice Tom French, BA’81, has mentored many students whose work has earned prizes in the Hearst, which he and others have called the Pulitzer Prizes of college journalism. As a journalism undergrad, French finished second in the Hearst national finals and, as a reporter at the St. Petersburg Times, he won a Pulitzer for feature writing a few years later.
“This year, our Hearst-winning reporters tackled complex and difficult stories on student deaths and on sexual assault,” he said. “They followed a coroner into his morgue, traveled deep under the surface of the earth to profile a coal miner, shadowed scalpers trying to sell IU football tickets in the rain. They were ready to arrive early, stay late, and keep reporting and revising and fact-checking until they literally dropped. I have a photo of Megan Jula, collapsed and fast asleep on the carpet of the IDS newsroom late-late-late on the night she and Mary Shown and Glory Sheeley finished their project on student deaths.”
French said the prestige of participating in the Hearst contest enhances students’ abilities to land news jobs after graduation. He listed several graduates who now are working at The Washington Post, Dallas Morning News, Tampa Bay Times, Garden & Gun Magazine, Portland Oregonian and others.
And, he said the Hearst wins reflect well on the new Media School, which includes the journalism program.
“I hope that promising young high school journalists around the country are paying attention to our students’ well-established record of ground-breaking work,” French said. “If you want to learn how to become a reporter and learn how to tackle work that matters, Indiana is calling your name.”
This is not IU’s first taste of success in the Hearst competition. In 2013, Charles Scudder, BAJ’14, won the national writing competition, and Danielle Paquette, BAJ’11, won in 2011. Several students have competed as finalists in the national contest over the last seven years, and IU has won first place overall in the writing competition four of the last six years.
In addition to writing, the program conducts two photojournalism contests, one radio, two television and four multimedia competitions, with championship finals in all divisions. Winners of those contests also will compete in San Francisco. IU placed 10th this year in photojournalism.
The Hearst Journalism Awards Program is conducted under the auspices of accredited schools of the Association of Schools of Journalism and Mass Communication and fully funded and administered by the William Randolph Hearst Foundation. The program awards up to $500,000 in scholarships and grants annually.
Breakdown: IU journalism students’ Hearst performance:
Breaking News
First, Megan Jula, “Woman sentenced to 20 years for aborting and discarding baby”
Ninth, Michael Majchrowicz, “Pence signs legislation to clarify RFRA bill, but LGBT still not a protected class in Indiana”
Profile Writing
First, Hannah Fleace, “Miner and mother”
Third, Michael Majchrowicz, “The guardian”
Sports Writing
Second, Evan Hoopfer, “Sold, not told”
Sixth, Michael Majchrowicz, “Getting to ‘sportsmanlike‘”
Enterprise Reporting
First, Samantha Schmidt, “Caught in the gray zone”
Eighth, Megan Jula, “When students die”
Feature Writing
Fourth, Jessica Contrera, “After the fall”
11th, Anicka Slachta, “The night shift”
Also, IU finished 10th in the Hearst photojournalism competition.