College Broadcasters Inc. selected six Hillsdale student radio and video productions as finalists for the 2023 National Student Production Awards.
Finalists include the four highest-ranked submissions for each of CBI’s award categories. This year, colleges from across the country sent in nearly 1,000 total submissions. CBI will announce the winners this October at the National Student Media Convention in Orlando, Florida.
“I can tell them, ‘Great job!’ over and over, but hearing it from someone outside the program, especially when being measured beside students from great radio/audio programs across the country, really can resonate with a student,” said Scot Bertram, general manager of WRFH Radio Free Hillsdale 101.7 FM.
Senior Abigail Snyder’s show “The Virtual Voyage” is one of the nominees for Best Regularly Scheduled Entertainment Program.
Snyder said the show was the result of her desire to share her passion for the history and culture of Israel with others, especially when travel was restricted during the COVID-19 pandemic.
“It’s an armchair travel show where I take people to my favorite sites in Israel, all from their comfort zone,” Snyder said. “So once you put on your headphones, you can be in your dorm room or your living room, and you get to feel like you’re there touching the Western Wall, or on the Temple Mount, or swimming in the Dead Sea.”
Snyder said each 22-minute episode of “The Virtual Voyage” requires eight to 10 hours of work to produce.
Among the finalists is “Hillsdale Student, American Hero,” a documentary film about the life of Hillsdale alumna Elizebeth Smith Friedman. The film, which was a class project for students in Buddy Moorehouse’s Documentary Filmmaking course, is Hillsdale’s only finalist in the CBI visual division.
Alumni Josh Barker and Christian Peck-Dimit, seniors Abigail Snyder, Maggie Wackenhut, and Maddy Welsh, and juniors Jack Cote, Linsey Larkin, Megan Pidcock, and Lauren Smyth contributed to the six finalist productions: “Election Night 2022,” “The Grammar Minute,” “Hillsdale Student, American Hero,” “Ian Fleming,” “Lauren Smyth News,” and “The Virtual Voyage.”
Smyth was nominated for awards in three categories: Best Newscast, Best Promo, and Best Documentary.
Smyth said she was most excited about her documentary project, which focused on the life of English writer Ian Fleming, best known as the author of the James Bond novels.
Smyth said she appreciated the challenge of trying to tell a story that was factually accurate but also entertaining and dramatic.
“I combined audio from the James Bond movies — whether it was music, sound effects, or dialogue — with clips of Ian Fleming talking,” Smyth said. “So, as Ian Fleming’s story progresses, so does James Bond’s story. You can kind of hear them both at the same time.”
Bertram said he attributes WRFH’s success to quality control, attention to detail, and focus on individual students.
“We don’t develop programs or content to win awards,” Bertram said. “The focus is on finding the right way for a student to get involved. How do we transfer the interests, passions, and knowledge of our students into audio form? That’s the question we try to answer.”
