NTU’s Broadcast Journalism students win top industry awards as they graduate

Arti Lukha, the senior news editor at ITV News, awarded the prize for Best TV Documentary to Mac Sainsbury-Plaice, offering him a placement working on ITV’s flagship evening news programme, describing his film called So Much to Say, as a moving and highly emotive piece of journalism.

She said, “It has been great to be associated with the course for three years now and we have seen many graduates from NTU joining our team as assistant producers.”

Nimesh Joshi, Programme and Digital Editor at ITV Central News, awarded the prize for Best TV Package to Jamie Slack, describing his report on potholes affecting motorists in Nottingham, as a strong example of story-telling. He said, “It was full of excellent shots and sequences with a case study at its heart and an effective piece to camera.

Nimesh also added, “It’s great to see the high standard of work and ambitious range of stories being covered by students on the course.”

Louise Easton, senior news editor for England and Wales at Bauer Media, awarded the prize for Best Radio Documentary to Millie Sian for her piece entitled Daring to Divorce. She said, “This delved into the taboo surrounding divorce in the South East Asian community with great sensitivity.”

Louise also gave runner-up prizes to Laura Parker and Andreea Pruteanu and invited all three graduates to work at Bauer radio stations across the country.

Martin Slack, news editor of BBC Radio Nottingham, awarded the prize for Best Radio Package and a work placement, to Anjy Olosunde, describing all the work submitted in the category as examples of strong audio story-telling. He said, “Anjy’s piece really took us to the comedy festival. Her presentation matched the energy of the performers on the stage making it a very engaging listen.

”I congratulate all those short-listed and to your tutors for helping you to achieves such high standards signalling that the future of radio news is alive and well here in Nottingham,” he added.

Matt Wallace, who owns Janno Media, awarded the Janno Media cash prize for Best Podcast to Anjy Olosunde and Jack Clark for their submission ‘Polar Opposites’.

This is the second year Janno Media has offered the award to an NTU journalist student to work with the company to develop their work. Anjy will now work with Janno Media to produce a podcast series.

Matt said, “In her submission Anjy said she was passionate about podcasting. It is exactly this kind of passion we want in the industry and we look forward to working with Anjy on this project.”

Finally, the best prize for Best Online Feature was awarded by Claire Catlow of Cartwright Communications to Olivia Jones for her article entitled ‘Finding Love in Later Life’. Olivia wins the opportunity to work on placement with the PR and communications agency which has offices in Nottingham and London.

Course leader, Gail Mellors, said, “Our strong ties with the broadcast media and the currency of our course, designed specifically to give our students the relevant industry skills they need to compete in this exciting and competitive career, enable our graduates to go straight from the course into extremely high-profile jobs in news and the creative sector.

“It’s heartening, once again, to see the talents of our students recognised as they leave us, destined for rewarding and worthwhile careers.”