National Broadcasting Society Goes Coast to Coast for Six Awards
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| (l -r) Nick Ballasy and Jonathan Schulter (Photo courtesy of NBS) |
Rider students earned first-place nods in the category of Public Affairs/Interview Category – Video for On the Issues: Interviews at the Democratic Debate in Philadelphia, edging the entry from the University of Miami; for Public Affairs/Interview Category – Audio for On the Issues with Nicholas Ballasy, featuring an interview with Miss New Jersey, Amy Polumbo, topping two nominations from Marshall University; and for the category of Commercial for Aquafresh Extreme Clean: Spin the Bottle, against entries from Chicago Clubs Commercial and Marietta College.
The Rider NBS first-place awards were not confined to students, however. Scott Alboum, video technologies coordinator in the Department of Communication and Journalism, and Dr. Barry Janes, professor of Communication, were also top finishers in the NBS Professional and Alumni competition for their video Date Rape: A Violation of Trust, an educational film about the dangers of and ways to avoid acquaintance rape and sexual assault.
“It explains how to prevent these types of incidents from happening to you and promote awareness of the issue,” said Alboum, who produced, directed and edited the production. “It also helps define what exactly ‘date rape’ actually is.”
Two more student entries, What’s Shakin’ and MIA: Music Interview Affair, earned honorable mention from the panel of NBS judges.
The winning student entries were all created as original programming for the Rider University Network (RUN). Seniors Nicholas Ballasy and Jonathan Schulter, as well as junior Sean Rainey, won for their work with On the Issues and On the Issues with Nicholas Ballasy, while Ballasy and Schulter claimed first-place honors for the Aquafresh spot. Senior Diana Vigorito and junior Kristen Salvatore earned honorable mention recognition for What’s Shakin’ and MIA: Music Interview Affair. Freshman Gina Grosso, who will serve as an NBS Rider chapter officer next year, also attended the convention, along with the five winning students.
Ballasy, the host and producer of On the Issues, says that he is proud of the evolution of Rider’s NBS chapter.
“It’s very unusual for a school that is only in its second full year as a chapter to win first-place awards, let alone four,” said Ballasy, a journalism/political science double major who helped push for the founding of the chapter. “We were nominated for three awards last year, too, in our first year with NBS, which really set the tone for the future. You can see a nice evolution in our work.”
One of the things Ballasy and his colleagues at RUN needed to organize their NBS chapter in the fall of 2006 was a faculty advisor. The choice was an easy one in Alboum, who had been an NBS member as a student at the University of Miami in the 1990s. For Alboum, his work has come full circle with his win this year.
“It was really exciting to win this year in the Professional and Alumni competition because I had also won as a student in 1997 and ’99 in the Video Documentary category,” Alboum explained. “To come back, especially with this group of students 10 years later and win again is incredibly rewarding.”
Date Rape: A Violation of Trust, which is also entered in the 2008 Telly Awards competition, is now being distributed nationally by Films Media Group, perhaps the largest distributor of educational programs in the nation, according to Janes, who served as the video’s executive producer.
“To go six for six in awards is especially impressive in that Rider was competing against some pretty big schools and programs,” Janes added. “The students all did a fantastic job with their productions, as well as in representing the best of Rider at the conference.”
More than 85 colleges and universities have chapters in the National Broadcasting Society, whose purpose is to encourage and reward scholarship and accomplishment among students of broadcasting, to establish meaningful communication between student and professional broadcasters and to foster integrity in the use of the powerful instruments of radio, television, film, cable and its many associated businesses and industries.
Submitted on March 28, 2008
