We're pleased to announce that WFIU and WTIU have earned a combined total of 48 awards in regional and national contests this May and June!
Together, WFIU and WTIU were honored with 22 awards at the Indiana Professional Chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists (SPJ) Best in Indiana Journalism Contest on June 14. The WFIU-WTIU News team took home 17 awards, with first-place awards for television investigative reporting, television medical/science reporting, best online multimedia, and radio continuing coverage. WTIU earned four awards, including a first place in environmental reporting and second place in features news videography for its TV series Journey Indiana and a respective first and second place in the television documentary category for Amen! Music of the Black Church and Feel of Vision. The WFIU-WTIU Digital team also won a third-place online award for the indianapublicmedia.org website.
WTIU won six regional Emmys during the NATAS Lower Great Lakes Chapter’s virtual awards ceremony held Saturday, June 12. Journey Indiana received three awards for best feature in news for its story on the man behind Parke County’s Bridgeton Mill and best features in environment/science for stories on fireflies and the Sandhill Crane migration. Three of WTIU’s documentaries were also honored with Emmys, including Ernie Pyle: Life in the Trenches for best writing, Amen! Music of the Black Church for best historical/cultural content, and A Rural Revolution: Indiana’s Round Barns for best nostalgia content.
The national Telly Awards announced on May 25 that WTIU and IU Radio and Television Services were the winners of 18 awards in its annual competition, which honors excellence in video and television across all screens. Five WTIU documentaries won Telly Awards. Ernie Pyle: Life in the Trenches earned a Gold Telly Award in the biography category and a Silver Telly Award for writing. Silver Awards were also given to Crooked Stick: Songs in a Strange Land in the live events category, Amen: Music of the Black Church in the religious/spiritual category, and A Rural Revolution: Indiana’s Round Barns in the cultural category. Actual World, Possible Future earned a Bronze Telly in the social responsibility category. Journey Indiana earned nine awards, including four Silvers in the history, cultural, editing, and videography/cinematography categories and five Bronze Telly Awards in the nature/wildlife, sports, documentary, religious/spiritual, and food and beverage categories. “Peggy’s Poetry and Zarg,” a segment from WTIU’s local children’s series The Friday Zone, earned a Bronze in the children’s category. WTIU’s digital series [Indi]android won a Bronze in the online documentary category for its feature on graphic novelist Nate Powell. IU Radio and Television Services also received a Bronze in the non-broadcast category for educational institution.
The WFIU-WTIU News team won two regional Edward R. Murrow Awards on May 6 for investigative reporting on Indiana’s contact tracing plans and best news documentary for A Mother’s Justice: The Trials of Lisa Montgomery. Murrow winners represent work of the highest quality produced by radio, television, and online news organizations around the world. Regional winners automatically advance to the national Edward R. Murrow Awards competition. National Murrow Award winners will be honored on October 27 during a ceremony in New York City.