UK Student Breaks Top 20 in Hearst Awards in Multimedia Narrative Storytelling

May 2020 journalism graduate Arden Barnes placed 13th in the Multimedia Narrative Storytelling Competition of the 2020-2021 Hearst Journalism Awards Program.

Barnes’ project, titled “The Courage to Win,” focused on 15-year-old Dani Brown from Lexington, who is an eight-time National Boxing Champion and current Team USA boxer set to compete in the 2024 Olympics. Brown began boxing at 9 years old when she joined Legends Boxing along with her older brother, Dale, who started boxing to help rehabilitate his lungs after having a double lung infection and pneumonia while he was in high school. “Brown said that her brother is her biggest inspiration,” said Barnes, when commenting on her work.

“The Courage to Win” comprises of a written portion, a YouTube video, several photographs and a content plan for Instagram. “The Courage to Win” can be found in its entirety at www.ardenbarnes.com/the-courage-to-win.

Barnes’ project was initially a product of her capstone JOU 498: Advanced Multimedia class, which is a requirement for journalism majors in the School of Journalism and Media within the College of Communication and Information. According to Barnes, Assistant Professor David Stephenson was her navigation through the unusual Spring 2020 semester. “Professor Stephenson was incredibly helpful in guiding the project, especially when we went completely virtual in March,” Barnes said. “It’s wonderful to see that good work can come out of different times of learning, even in a pandemic.”

"I'm so proud of Arden for being recognized at the national level for her talent and hard work. Our class and her project were completely upended in March by the pandemic, yet she persisted and finished with a great story," Stephenson said.

Barnes is happy to see her hard work pay off in the Hearst Awards. “It’s always really exciting to see the University of Kentucky alongside other nationally renowned journalism schools.”

The Hearst Journalism Awards Program was founded as a way to support and assist journalism education at the collegiate level. The program awards scholarships to students with outstanding performance in divisions including writing, photojournalism, audio, television and multimedia competitions. To enter any competition hosted by the Hearst Awards, students must be involved in campus media and must have published articles, photographs or newscasts that can be submitted.