May 18, 2020, e-Cursor: Ontiveros, Baier lead way at Just Desserts; Gyorke photo contest; UA honors Prof. Knight; Rich Holden obit.

Photo by Amy Bailey/Arizona Daily Wildcat

Vanessa Ontiveros, former Wildcat news editor, won the Mangelsdorf Award as top newsperson.

SCHOOL HONORS STUDENTS
IN VIRTUAL CEREMONY

Students Vanessa Ontiveros, Rocky Baier, Tommie Huffman and Dominika Heusinkveld captured top honors May 13 at the University of Arizona School of Journalism’s 54th Just Desserts awards celebration.

Ontiveros received the Philip Mangelsdorf Award for Outstanding Newsperson of the Year, which recognizes the top reporter/journalist in the program. She was an apprentice reporter at the Arizona Daily Star, a student employee at Arizona Public Media for The Buzz podcast and radio show, and news editor at the Arizona Daily Wildcat.

(L-R) Rocky Baier, Tommie Huffman, Dominika Heusinkveld

Baier captured the Sherman R. Miller 3rd Award for Outstanding Senior. She was an apprentice reporter at the Arizona Daily Star and a breaking news intern at the Arizona Republic. She recently landed a summer internship at the Wall Street Journal.

Huffman received the Brewster P. Campbell Award for Outstanding Junior. Huffman is minoring in marine science and attended the Online News Association conference in New Orleans.

Heusinkveld was named the Outstanding Graduate Student. She is turning her master's project, “Flying Car: Why personal flying vehicles never took off,” into a book.

More than 100 people attended the virtual ceremony via Zoom and Facebook Live. Director Carol Schwalbe emceed the event, which had been scheduled for the Arizona Historical Society before the COVID-19 pandemic struck.

“We will never forget the way you persevered despite unprecedented disappointment and hardship," Schwalbe told students in her intro.

Assistant Professor Susan Swanberg received the
Hugh and Jan Harelson Excellence in Teaching Award, for which students nominate professors and an outside committee votes on the winner. Swanberg also won the award in 2019.

Kris Hogeboom, a senior business manager, won the Carol and Cecil Schwalbe Staff Award for Outstanding Service.

The ceremony saw 18 more awards and 18 scholarships given out. Read about them here.

In addition, the school handed out Jane Swicegood exploration grants to master's students Alisa Ivanitskaya and Meredith O'Neil. Swicegood, a longtime donor, established the fund for students to travel, buy equipment or conduct research.

• Congrats video (above) to Class of 2020
• Video of Just Desserts ceremony
• Just Desserts program, list of graduates

Note: Sarah Kezele ('11) emceed the university's 156th commencement ceremony. She also co-emceed the school's inaugural Hall of Fame event.

NOTABLE

STUDENT WORK
• Despite the pandemic, students in Prof. Ruxandra Guidi's El Inde/Arizona Sonora News and Prof. Rogelio Garcia's Arizona Cat's Eye classes produced insightful reporting and essays for online, radio and television. See and hear their work at
indearizona.com and
tinyurl.com/azcateye.
• Anika Pasilas wrote an emotional column for the Arizona Daily Star about her grandmother, who died from the coronavirus.
• Students at the Arizona Daily Wildcat published COVID-19 content at wildcat.arizona.edu.

HALL OF FAME
• The school is accepting nominations for its second Hall of Fame, set for spring 2021. Describe in no more than 350 words why the candidate is worthy, and email the letter to Mike Chesnick. Previous nominees will automatically be eligible. Nominating rules are at the bottom of the 2018 induction story.

NEW-LOOK WEBSITE
• Check out the School of Journalism's redesigned website. It includes a new video to attract majors.

ALUMNI NEWS
• Ciara Encinas ('18) started as a multimedia journalist at KGUN-TV in Tucson after two years at KYMA-TV in Yuma.
• Alex Eschelman ('19) started this month as a sports reporter for ABC Fox Montana in Bozeman.
• Sam McNeil ('14 M.A.), an Associated Press video journalist, did COVID-19 reporting from Wuhan, China.

FACULTY CONGRATS
• Jeannine Relly was promoted to full professor.
• Prof. Ruxandra Guidi published an audio essay on her daughter and the pandemic in BorderLore.

REMEMBERING BOB
Robert Crawford ('59) died April 9 after battling leukemia. Crawford, 82, was sports editor at the Phoenix Gazette and on the school's Journalism Advisory Council. Obit

Bilagody captures Gyorke award

Marison Bilagody won the spring 2020 Drew Gyorke Memorial Photojournalism Award for his image of a woman adding a name to the Rialto nightclub marquee in downtown Tucson.

Madison McCormick
took second with a photo of a woman getting a tattoo, while Mackenzie Payton placed third for her image of a cowboy teaching a child how to rope a calf.

The contest featured 12 finalists from Prof. Kim Newton’s JOUR 203 photography class. The contest was established in 2013 by the family of Drew Gyorke, an aspiring UA photojournalist who died in a car accident.

• Full story and images

Prof. Knight lands teaching award

Susan Knight, now a full professor of practice, is receiving the new Gerald G. Swanson Prize for Teaching Excellence in recognition of her exceptional skills as a teacher and mentor.

The award, which focuses on undergraduate teaching at the University of Arizona, comes with a check for $5,000. Knight will be honored at a ceremony in the fall.

“You have demonstrated a vivid, motivating and innovative teaching methodology ... and made an enormous impact in your students," Provost Liesl Folks wrote.

Knight learned later that UA had promoted her to full professor of practice.

• Full story

Diversity champ Holden dies at 70

Richard S. Holden, part of the school's Journalism Advisory Council and one of the nation's leaders in bringing diversity to the newsroom, died April 15.

Holden, 70, a Wall Street Journal copy chief and Dow Jones News Fund director, spent 20 years teaching at the Maynard Institute’s Editing Program for Minority Journalists at the UA J-school.

“Rich was a fierce, outspoken and effective proponent for diversity efforts," former Director Jacqueline Sharkey said.

Added Frank Sotomayor, advisory council chair, "I will miss his humor and dedication to producing first-class journalism.”

• Full obit

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