COLLEGE PARK -- Kate DeBlasis ’21, a spring graduate from the University of Maryland Philip Merrill College of Journalism, placed third in the National Hearst Journalism Championships' multimedia competition, the William Randolph Hearst Foundation announced.
DeBlasis won a $5,000 scholarship.
The multimedia championship is the culmination of the three monthly multimedia competitions held during the academic year.
Five finalists submitted the top winning multimedia pieces from 215 entries received in the Narrative Video Storytelling, Innovative Storytelling, and Digital News or Enterprise Competitions.
During the championship, the finalists completed a spot assignment on a tight deadline. The championship assignment had the finalists tell a multimedia story about re-emergence in their home communities. DeBlasis produced a story on Ellicott City called "Come Brood X or High Water: A City Remains."
DeBlasis qualified for the multimedia championship with her 2020 Capital News Service story, “COVID on Campus: Student experiences in quarantine,” where she talked to students across the U.S. about their experiences in quarantine during their Fall 2020 term.
DeBlasis, a broadcast-focused journalism major, has been a part of the journalism world since elementary school, when she was the TV morning news anchor in fifth grade. At UMD, she was a campus tour guide and hosted a radio show with her roommate for WMUC. She also participated in “Survivor: Maryland” her sophomore year, and was part of the executive board of the production.
A past intern for the Time4Coffee podcast and Lucky Dog Films, she is actively job searching after graduating in May. While not editing video or audio, DeBlasis said she loves binge-watching TV shows and documentaries while obsessing over her one plant.
For more information, contact:
Josh Land
joshland@umd.edu
301-405-1321