Local students take first place in national journalism challenge

Published 8:37 am Monday, March 13, 2023

By Ron Marvel

Star Correspondent

Remarkable! With no real journalism training, nine students from Elizabethton High School took first in a national journalism challenge sponsored by PBS, taking first place in both the audio and video categories. On Friday morning at Elizabethton High School in front of a crowd of students, parents and others celebrated the accomplishments of these plucky, imaginative students.

EHS Teacher Alex Campbell who teaches the Teaching as a Profession class, shared this potential project with his students, and they jumped on the opportunity; given the topic “My Education, My Future” The video students submitted their project which asked the question why our school has no windows. In the process of doing this project, they figured out that due to the fact the building was designed during the 1970’s the issue of energy efficiency and the oil embargoes was first and foremost in people’s minds, so windows were left out of the design due to concern of heat loss.  The audio students tackled the question of why field trips aren’t continued in high school, dealing with the subject of student engagement and what solutions can be offered. Junior Kara Cole shared, “ I wanted students to understand there are other ways they can learn and that they can do things to better their own education.”

Along the way, Campbell and his students wisely decided to bring in others in the community who had experience in journalism, such as Tom Taylor, who provides the voice of the Cyclones and has conducted interviews for over 30 years and Josh Smith, former EHS Alumni,  who serves as the anchor for WJHL News. Eric Kitchens, who has worked on films and documentaries, also came and provided his expertise in editing.

The community coming together to provide their assistance was not lost on these students. EHS student Gracie Yoder during the school’s “journalism celebration,” expanded on that thought “I learned that education is just not Math and English; it’s talking and listening and engaging with the community.” EHS Teacher Alex Campbell echoed those thoughts, “I think this showed us we have amazing students who can accomplish amazing things, but it also showed how the community can come together and offer support to these students.”

The students were awarded $250 gift cards, individualized trophies and gift packs that consisted of other gift cards, water bottles, t-shirts and goodies. They also got to interview and speak to professional journalists; in addition, the video submission was featured on PBS News Hour, which is seen by 8 million viewers. Beyond just this opportunity, Campbell talked about the skills the students learned “they learned how to better communicate and how to interview folks from all over the country and how to conduct themselves in a professional manner during the process; they are getting some great life skills,” Campbell added. PBS will also offer a camp in Boston teaching journalism that these EHS students will have an inside track to attend.

During the ceremony, each student talked about what they personally learned during the project. They each talked about their challenges, and how they were able to overcome these challenges and present winning submissions. After the ceremony, senior EHS student Brilee Hurley spoke about what he took from the project, “the main thing I took from this is to try something to push yourself; there was a lot of trial and error, a lot of retakes, we had to stay patient with each other and ourselves. I think all of this will help us in the long run,” Hurley said. Both winning submissions can be viewed at https://www.pbs.org/newshour/press-releases/srls-student-journalism-challenge-winners-announced