Mayo students win journalism awards
MAYO students have won two separate journalism competitions at University of Limerick (UL).
Shane McNamara, an MA in Journalism student at UL, won the inaugural University of Limerick Irish Examiner Video Journalism prize while Claremorris man Cillian Sherlock took the top prize in the UL/Live 95 FM radio journalism competition.
Broadcast on IrishExaminer.ie, Shane McNamara's multimedia piece entitled 'Rescue 116: The people behind the recovery' focused on those involved in the efforts to recover the bodies of those lost when Coast Guard helicopter Rescue 116 crashed in March.
Captain Mark Duffy (51), Captain Dara Fitzpatrick (45), winch operator Ciarán Smith (38) and winchman Paul Ormsby (53) died when the helicopter crashed 12km off the Co. Mayo coast.
Editorial manager for the Irish Examiner, Diane McDermott, who presented the cheque to Mr. McNamara in UL this week, said Shane’s work stood out due to its attention to detail and came top of a strong field of entrants.
The competition was the culmination of a partnership between UL and the Irish Examiner, in which coursework produced by UL journalism students was broadcast to a national audience.
Mr. McNamara said he had chosen to focus on the Rescue 116 story for a number of reasons.
“Obviously the scale of this unfathomable tragedy rocked the country and headlined the news for some time. For me, there was something closer to home. I have family and friends involved with both the Coast Guard and the RNLI and I know first hand the dedication and the risks involved while volunteering for these organisations.
“This is something I hoped to show the public through this video. The project itself gave me some invaluable experience with regards to editing, interviewing and filming and I feel that I have learned a lot from it,” he continued.
Head of Journalism at University of Limerick Dr. Fergal Quinn congratulated Mr. McNamara on the win, adding that he was delighted at the standard of work showcased.
“Shane is a very talented young journalist and he produced what I thought was a very insightful and sensitive piece about what drives the extraordinary voluntary effort to recover the bodies of those lost at sea. As well as the winning entry, there was a very high standard of work produced by our students which attests to the potential and quality of our young journalism graduates,” he stated.
Watch the video on http://www.irishexaminer.com/video/news/rescue-116-the-people-behind-the-recovery-449636.html.
Cillian Sherlock, a fourth year student of UL’s BA in Journalism and New Media programme, was named the winner of this year’s UL/Live 95FM radio journalism competition. The winning entry was a radio package dealing with the issue of drug driving.
Head of news at Live 95FM, Gillian Devlin judged this year’s competition. “We had a wide range of entries this year from final year journalism students at UL. They dealt with a number of issues including drink driving, infant death and student gambling. The entries were of a high news value and were creatively produced,” she stated.
At the award presentation, Mr. Sherlock said: 'I'm delighted to receive this award from Live 95fm. It's a fantastic way to finish up my degree in Journalism and New Media at UL. My radio modules at UL enabled me to create a piece that would both inform and educate the audience on an issue which is of growing concern.”
Live 95FM works closely with students from the department of journalism at UL.
As the first prize recipient, Cillian received €500 from Live 95FM. Cillian has just completed his final year at University of Limerick and is due to graduate with a BA in Journalism and New Media later this summer. He is currently working at ‪Independent.ie on a Google fellowship.
UL journalism students secured three of the five fellowships offered to journalism students across Ireland in 2017.