Charmed win: WUTM takes 3rd straight during SEJC

WUTM, FM 90.3, "The Hawk," UTM's student-run radio station, proved Friday night, Feb. 10, that the third time was indeed the charm.

The station won its third straight designation as Best College Radio Station during the 26th Southeast Journalism Conference convention, hosted this year – and for the first time – by UTM's student media and the Department of Communications.

The win also marks the fifth year that WUTM has placed in the top three in the annual SEJC "Best of the South" awards competition.

Other WUTM and Pacer award winners during the convention were: Josh Lemons, fourth place in page design; Allison Jones, third place in radio reporting; WUTM, second place in audio news; Josh Weiss, eighth place in sports reporting; and Cheryl DeYeso, eighth place in graphic design.

Nearly 200 students from 26 southeastern universities descended on UTM on Feb. 9. The next day, many of them became  part of one of the largest mock disaster undertakings in West Tennessee.

"The drill began as a small ‘what if' when I and my student planning committee were tossing around ideas on how we could make our convention on-site competition more of a real-world experience," said Tomi Parrish, 2011-2012 SEJC president and journalism instructor at UTM.

"However, thanks to our county emergency management office, it mushroomed into what we were told Friday night was the largest-scale disaster exercise ever to take place in West Tennessee and, possibly, the largest that has ever taken place in the state," Parrish said.

When UTM partnered with Weakley County Emergency Management last summer, the competition grew to encompass several mock disaster sites in Martin and on campus. The convention and the disaster drill were both constructed around an earthquake theme that would also serve as a major disaster exercise for local EMS workers.

One site featured a school bus and several cars at the base of a bridge simulating a pancake collapse of a bridge from an earthquake. Around 30 volunteer victims helped to simulate the disaster as students were able to observe and report the scene and emergency workers practiced rescue operations.

Another site was set up with a small structure built to simulate a house that had sunk several feet into the ground as a result of the earthquake, and another large house in Weakley County was the location of a mock home for mentally challenged patients in need of rescue. A final coverage site was a triage location for victims. Over 45 volunteers acted as victims on scene.

University vans transported competing students to each disaster site, where they gathered information and combined it into reports and stories for judging.

"[The local emergency workers] had to deal with people who aren't from around here and the people who aren't from around here had to think on their feet very quickly, which you would have to do if you worked for a big media outlet and were sent anywhere in the world," Parrish said of the experiential event.

The Southeast Journalism Conference is a nonprofit organization, composed of schools from eight Southeast states, that believes in furthering journalism education through conventions and competitions.

Featured at the annual three-day convention this year were competitive journalism contests designed to test students' abilities in such areas as news writing, feature writing, radio reporting, photojournalism, public relations, TV reporting, law, history, ethics, page design, multimedia design, copy editing and current events.

The conference also featured morning breakout sessions with speakers who are experts in news, photography, sports, promotions and radio; a political roundtable; and an afternoon media fair.

Keynote speakers for the event were Kara DeFrias, a television writer and producer from San Diego; and UTM alumna Jennifer Horbelt, an anchor and reporter for KOAA TV in Pueblo / Colorado Springs, Colo.

Numerous UTM students and faculty members, particularly those affiliated with student media and the Department of Communications, worked tirelessly on the convention. They designed and judged competitions, were ambassadors to the visiting schools, filmed and photographed the disaster drill, acted as disaster victims, drove vans, and reported on all the events via social media.