KBIA-FM, KOMU-TV win nine awards from Missouri Broadcasters Association
One of KBIA’s first-place plaques was for “Save a Life.”
Katie Quinn, BJ ’23, reported on the community conversation, hosted by KBIA.
Two recent School graduates cap off their senior years with first-place awards for their work
By Nate Brown
Osage Beach, Mo. (June 7, 2023) — NPR-member station KBIA-FM and NBC affiliate KOMU-TV, both staffed by students at the Missouri School of Journalism, each won two first-place awards from the Missouri Broadcasters Association on June 3. The stations also won a total of five certificates of merit.
One of KBIA’s first-place plaques was for “Save a Life,” a December event in Columbia, Missouri, where residents learned about Narcan, a lifesaving drug that can reverse an opioid overdose. Katie Quinn, BJ ’23, reported on the community conversation, hosted by KBIA.
“The event took six months to prepare,” said Quinn, who worked on “Save a Life” with Becky Smith, reporter and producer for the KBIA Health and Wealth Desk, and Kassidy Arena, BJ ’20, KBIA engagement producer. “We taught 75 people how to use Narcan and distributed it. We also built a webpage that taught people how to use Narcan, and we did a lot of substance use disorder reporting.”
KOMU and Matt McCabe, BJ ’23, won Best Photojournalist for his work on the One Newsroom series “2,500 Below: The changing landscape of Missouri’s small towns.”
“This was one of the most important series I worked on during my time at Mizzou,” said McCabe, BJ ‘23, “and I am really happy it was recognized.
“Awards like this also recognize all of the professors and mentors who spent the past four years building me up,” added McCabe. “The resources and education provided by the Missouri School of Journalism empowers me to produce journalism at a competitive level.”
The two J-School broadcast media outlets won the following awards:
KBIA-FM
- First Place, Documentary/Public Affairs, for Radio Friends with Paul Pepper.
- First Place, Station-sponsored Community Event, for “Save a Life: Community conversation and Narcan demonstration.” Reporting by senior Katie Quinn.
- Certificate of Merit, Best Local Website, for kbia.org.
- Certificate of Merit, Podcast, for High Turnout Wide Margins.
KOMU-TV
- First Place, Best Photojournalist, for senior Matt McCabe.
- First Place, Best Weathercast, for Matt Beckwith.
- Certificate of Merit, Best News Anchor, for Taylor Freeman, MA ‘22.
- Certificate of Merit, Breaking News, for “Columbia family mourns loss of two children in apartment fire.” Reporting by seniors Ashlyn Green and Reyna Katko.
- Certificate of Merit, Investigative Reporting, for “CPD officers violate body camera policy during 2021 officer-involved shooting.” Reporting by sophomore Avery Grosvenor.
KBIA-FM, mid-Missouri’s NPR-member station, reaches 14 counties and has served mid-Missouri since 1972. KBIA is a university-licensed, community-supported not-for-profit institution, actively involved in the life of the mid-Missouri area. The station is the area’s largest provider of arts programming, serving more than 30,000 listeners and members each week.
KOMU-TV is the area’s NBC affiliate and is the only university-owned commercial television station in the U.S. that uses its newsroom as a working lab for students. KOMU is an auxiliary enterprise of the University of Missouri and generates all revenue from station operations; its investments in broadcast technology are funded entirely via advertising and retransmission revenues. KOMU receives no funding from the university or state.
Updated: June 9, 2023