WKU wins first in Hearst photojournalism competition

BOWLING GREEN, Ky. – Western Kentucky University’s School of Media and Communication has won the Intercollegiate Photojournalism Competition for the 30th time in the last 36 years.

According to the university, two WKU students earned awards in the photojournalism picture/story series competition.

WKU says it had the highest total student points in the two photo competitions of the 2024-25 Hearst Journalism Awards Program and will receive a $10,000 award.

Other top 10 photojournalism finishers include University of Kentucky, University of Montana, University of Kansas, Ohio University, University of Missouri, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Syracuse University, University of Arizona and University of Florida.

Arthur Trickett-Wile, a post-baccalaureate photojournalism major from San Antonio, Texas, finished third in the photojournalism picture/story series competition and will receive a $1,500 award. WKU’s School of Media and Communication will receive a matching award.

WKU student Sean McInnis, a senior photojournalism major from Louisville, finished ninth in the competition.

The 65th annual Hearst Journalism Awards Program offers 14 competitions annually, including four writing, two photo, one studio, two television, four multimedia and one podcast awarding up to $700,000 in scholarships, matching grants and stipends.

Currently, there are 105 universities with accredited undergraduate journalism programs eligible to participate in the Hearst competitions.

WKU’s School of Media and Communication continued its tradition of national success in the Hearst Journalism Awards Program with a sixth-place finish in the 2024 overall intercollegiate competition.

WKU has placed in the top eight overall for 31 straight years with four overall championships in 2000, 2001, 2005 and 2018, has won the intercollegiate photojournalism competition 30 times in the past 36 years and has won the intercollegiate multimedia competition nine times since it was added in 2010.

WKU students have won 17 Hearst individual national championships since 1985 — photojournalism in 1987, 1988, 1991, 1992, 1996, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2008, 2010, 2014 and 2016; multimedia in 2015, 2023 and 2024; writing in 1985 and radio news in 2006.