2026 Best of Festival Awards Ceremony

During the ceremony, recipients will be recognized with a specialized screening of their winning project and a cash award of $1,000 from the Diana King Memorial Endowment.The 2026 Best of Festival winners were selected from a pool of over 2,250 entries, representing over 300 colleges and universities in the following competitions: audio, documentary, film & video, interactive multimedia, news, scriptwriting, sports and two-year colleges. 2026 Best of Festival Winners Audio Competition - Faculty The Traveling Radio Show Goes to the CSU!; Jeff Jacoby, San Francisco State University (Long-Form Production Category) Audio Competition - Student  Deliver U.S.; Krystal Guerra, Texas Christian University (Narrative Audio Category) Documentary Competition - Faculty  Chicken Ghetto; Sangsun Choi & Paul Lee, Kennesaw State University (Short-Form Category) Documentary Competition - Student  Hunter; Jack Hanning, Carter Moore, Nick Reed & Rylie West, University of Tennessee (Documentary Feature Category) Film & Video Competition - Faculty Kid Super Pilot; Christian Washington, Huntington University Arizona (Narrative Video Category) Film & Video Competition - Student Southern Apocrypha; Eli Murray, Ethan Hickey, Jordan Moore & Amy Csaki, Middle Tennessee State University (Narrative – Mini Narrative Category) Komets Blackout Night Promo; Bryce Garrett, Huntington University (Promotional Category) Interactive Multimedia Competition - Faculty Eyes of Freedom Immersive; Pat Clark, University of Colorado Boulder (Interactive Reality Category) Interactive Multimedia Competition – Student As Tough As Ice; Murphy McFarlane, Syracuse University (Multimedia Storytelling Category) News Competition - Faculty From Denver to Mecca: A CNN producer’s personal pilgrimage to Islam’s holiest site; Kareem El Damanhoury, Muhammad Darwish, Angelica Pursley & Matog Saleh, University of Denver (Television Feature News Reporting Category) News Competition - Student 40 Feet In the Air; Boone Kilpatrick, Syracuse University (Radio Reporting Category) The New Florida Follies; Alex Land, University of Florida (Television Reporting Category) Centre County Report: April 4, 2025; Allie Wenskoski, Sarah Schultz, Francie Ebert, Hannah Neurohr, Owen Gelber & Denys Khrulov, Penn State University (Television Newscast Category) Scriptwriting Competition - Faculty All These Lonesome Graveyards; Nathan Patton, Missouri State University (Original Television Series Pilot Category) Scriptwriting Competition - Student Bandit; Cooper Johnson, Missouri State University (Original Television Series Pilot Category) Sports Competition - Faculty Authentic ACC: Syracuse Spring Football; Jordan Kligerman, Austin Beehner, Mike Lang & Richard Wiesmann, Syracuse University (Long Form Sports Video Category) Sports Competition - Student Ball State Sports Link: My Black Is; Nate Locker & Amadou Diallo, Ball State University (Promotional Video/Tease/PSA Category) Student Two-Year Colleges Competition 25 Years of Harper Radio; Zoe Meshenberg, Harper College (Non-Narrative Audio Category) Graduate Student Competition Piloting the Past into the Future; Rio Harper, Dian Ling, Nicole Cummings & Nathan Olszewski, Syracuse University (Documentary)