Broadcast Education Association Announces 2016 Best of Festival Winners

Eighteen faculty and student works have been chosen to receive the BEA Best of Festival King Foundation Awards – the top awards given during BEA’s Festival of Media Arts, a competitive festival open to BEA faculty and student members.

Best of Festival winners will be honored at the 14th Annual BEA Best of Festival King Foundation Awards Ceremony in Las Vegas on Monday, April 18, 2016 as part of BEA’s annual convention, in conjunction with the annual NAB Show. During the ceremony, recipients will be recognized with a specialized screening of their winning project and a cash award of $1,000 from the Charles and Lucille King Family Foundation.

The 2016 Best of Festival winners were selected from a pool of over 1,500 entries, representing over 175 colleges and universities in the following competitions: audio, documentary, interactive multimedia, news, scriptwriting, sports, two-year/small colleges and video.

2016 Best of Festival Winners

Faculty Audio Competition
Geri Alumit Zeldes, April Van Buren, WKAR Radio, and School of Journalism, Michigan State University; The Living History Project (Long-Form Production)

Student Audio Competition
Jennifer Johnson, Southern Illinois University – Carbondale; Camp Giant City – Panthers (Comedy or Drama)

Faculty Documentary Competition
John C.P. Goheen, Loyola University Chicago; The Fence of the Bear (Short Form Video or Film Documentary)

Student Documentary Competition
Megan Rakoczy, Elizabeth Ruiz & Weston Dockter, Colorado State University; Bean to Bar: Chocolate Unwrapped (Short Form Video or Film Documentary)

Faculty Interactive Multimedia Competition
Joel Beeson & Emily Pelland, West Virginia University; Fractured Tour: An Immersive VR Tour of Selma’s Divides (Entertainment & Emerging Technologies)

Student Interactive Multimedia Competition
Kayli Kunkel, Drake University; Urban Plains (Large Team)

Faculty News Competition
David Chanatry, Utica College; Seneca Lake Blockade (Radio Hard News Reporting)

Student News Competition
Nicky Ouellet, University of Montana; An 80’s Cover Band with Global Dreams (Radio Feature Reporting)

Daniel Hamburg, Michigan State University; You Couldn’t Pay Me Enough (Television Feature Reporting)

Emilio Ramos De Jesus, Danielle Maroney & Sarah Rudlang, St. Cloud State University; UTVS News (Television Newscast Airing 4 or 5 days per week)

Faculty Scriptwriting Competition
Daniel C. Walsh, Appalachian State University; The Saint of Savannah (Feature/TV Hour)

Student Scriptwriting Competition
Becca Thompson, Missouri State University; When the Morning Comes (Short Subject)

Faculty Sports Competition
Michael Bruce, University of Alabama; TideSports.com TV (TV Sports Event Direction and Production)

Student Sports Competition
Ricky Lasser & Karen Tang, University of Maryland; ViewFinder: ParaCommandos (TV Sports Story/Feature)

Student 2-Year/Small College Competition
Sam Senser & Jake Bruce, Metropolitan Community College; The Adventures of Vanman and Truckboy (Video/Broadcast Production)

Faculty Video Competition
Lance Clark, Huntington University; The Gift of Hope (Narrative)

Student Video Competition
Anthony Williams, Kansas State University; Maize Mosaic Virus (Instructional/Educational)

Xavier Burgin, Jenna Cavelle & Jacob Eben, USC School of Cinematic Arts; Olde E (Narrative)

For a complete list of winners for all of the Festival of Media Arts competitions, please visit www.beafestival.org.