On Wednesday and Thursday April 15 through 16, Emerson High School’s Unbranded Broadcast team competed against other schools within the district through on-site competitions as well as pre-submitted segments at the Frisco ISD Broadcast Competition. Despite the tough competition, the broadcast students competed well, and brought home both awards and new experiences.
One type of competition was on-site, meaning that competitors would have only one day to plan, script, record, and edit their segments. The time constraints themselves were a challenge for competitors who would normally have a week or more to put their segment together. To succeed at this takes a lot of skill and a lot of practice.
“I was competing in two events at once, so I had to have a balance between the two,” junior Janelle Nelson said. “I had the support of my partner Hannah, so I was able to dedicate half the time to one event and half the time to the other event.”
Nelson placed third in General News Package with her partner, senior Hannah Hill in addition to placing first in her other on-site competition for Stand-Ups. Another pair from the broadcast team, junior Humza White and junior Bryce Holland also competed in the General News Package, but chose to do the category in which a prompt would be provided.
“We knew what we were getting ourselves into,” White said. “Last year me and Bryce were first place district champions, so it was a little bit higher of an expectation this time around.”
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Grace Torres, 12, Hannah Hill, 12, Janelle Nelson, 11, Bryce Holland, 11, Giovanni Cameau, 12, and Humza White, 12 competed in on-site competitions for this year’s Broadcast Competition.
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Hannah Hill, 12, and Janelle Nelson, 11, review their prompt before starting the competition.
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Grace Torres, 12, films the competition turn-in process for her event highlight video.
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Humza White, 11, and Iksha Kesari, 12, won second place for their entertainment segment, “The Couple’s Game.”
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Grace Torres, 12, and Giovanni Cameau, 12, position a camera to film b-roll.
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Dylan Hollomon, 11, Cameron Johnson, 11, and Katelyn Kennedy, 11, brought home another first place victory for their UIL State Champion-awarded narrative film, “The Literary Adventures of Dylan and Cam.”
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Hannah Hill, 12, edits her news segment.
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Janelle Nelson, 11, edits footage for her news segment with Hannah Hill, 12.
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Grace Torres, 12, culls footage for her video project.
Despite this being their second time doing this category together, the competition still posed many challenges. Their prompt required them to report on the benefits of AI and their impacts in the classroom. Recording footage of AI usage and impacts what a difficulty they both had to overcome. Luckily, their experiences in the broadcast class in combination with help from their teacher, Giulia Tolar, they had all the knowledge they needed.
“You’re trained and you’re prepared because you practice those things on a day to day basis, so when it’s time for the competition, you’re not scrambling and trying to figure out what to do,” Holland said.
On the second day of the competition, students who had submitted for a category had the opportunity to attend, listen to guest speakers, meet new people and watch the awards. This gave students an opportunity to view some segments their peers put together and learn from adults with valuable experience in the field.
“[I enjoyed] getting to learn about other experiences and what’s really possible because a lot of people just think that journalism in general is just, oh, you’re on CNN,” White said. “It’s part of it, but there’s so many bigger things.”
Each of the competitors on Emerson’s broadcast are highly skilled, however, many of the students began their journey through the broadcast program in Audio/Video Production 1 towards the beginning of their high school careers with little experience and possibly even little interest.
“Originally, I thought I wasn’t gonna like anything about [the class]. I didn’t expect it to be this long-lasting thing,” White said. “I like that it gives you the ability to be creative…and I feel like it’s important to deliver the news to people.”
This competition is much more than a high school event, it provides passionate students with a chance to show off their skills and push their limits under high pressure in order to become the best they possibly can.
“I plan on going into sports broadcasting as a major for college…and I think competitions like this and this class really helps me with that,” Holland said.
