UNC Media and Journalism School Wins 2016 Hearst National Championship

The UNC School of Media and Journalism won the 2016 national championship in the Hearst Journalism Awards competition – what many consider to be the Pulitzers of collegiate journalism.

The championship was the culmination of the 2015-16 Hearst Journalism Awards competitions, which are held among the 108 competing member colleges and universities. These year-long competitions are held in writing, photojournalism, radio news, television news and multimedia.

The schools with the most points earned by their students in each category are designated the winners of the intercollegiate competitions.

UNC finished overall first in photojournalism, first in broadcast, second in multimedia and fifth in writing. These wins earned the school $24,000 in awards from Hearst.

Six UNC students were among the 28 from across the nation competing in San Francisco from May 30 through June 3 in the individual competitions. Dean Susan King and Professors Charlie Tuggle and Pat Davison accompanied the students to San Francisco.

Two of the UNC students, CB Cotton and Emily Rhyne, won the individual national championships, each earning a $5,000 award. Cotton competed in the broadcast news category while Rhyne competed in multimedia. Rhyne also won a $1,000 award for Best Multimedia Story of the Year.

Two more UNC students finished in the top three of the individual national honors in the photojournalism category. Dillon Deaton took second place and a $4,000 award, and Tegan Johnston took third place with a $3,000 award.

Jaclyn Lee and Ben Smart were both honored as finalists in the Television Broadcast News Championship and awarded $1,500. Smart also won a $1,000 award for Best Use of Television for News Coverage.

This is the school’s sixth overall national championship, making UNC the only school to have finished in the top five every year since 2004.

The Hearst Journalism Awards Program was founded in 1960 to encourage journalism education through scholarships and competitions. Over the years, the program has awarded more than $12 million in scholarships and grants to the top student journalists in the country.