Kentucky Wesleyan College’s WKWC 90.3 FM earned recognition when the Broadcast Education Association (or BEA) recently announced the rankings of schools based on the creative achievement of their students. Panther Radio ranked 92nd in the Top Winning Overall Programs while also ranking 21st in Top Winning Audio Programs.
The rankings are founded on the results from the BEA Festival of Media Arts from the past five years. The BEA Festival is the preeminent international media competition focused on student and faculty creative endeavors.
“These rankings may not seem that significant until you realize that the rankings are based on five years,” said Derik Hancock, instructor of communications and WKWC manager. “We began competing in the BEA competition just two years ago. I can easily see our rankings increase year after year until we’re in the top ten!”
In the past five years, over 5,000 student creative works were submitted from BEA’s more than 300 member institutions around the world. Entries go through a blind-juried review in the following competitions: Audio, Documentary, Film & Video, Interactive Multimedia & Emerging Technologies, News, Scriptwriting, and Sports.
While the BEA has been evaluating student works for nearly 20 years in competition, the rankings are based on the past five-year period of student success. Additionally, there is an Overall Ranking based on a combined achievement across the multiple media creative disciplines. The festival winners represent approximately the top 20% of entries. The rankings consider both the quantity and quality of student works.
In 2021, communications arts major, Lain Taleno, won second place in the category for Best Comedy or Drama for his production of “Sherlock Holmes: The Adventure of the Tolling Bell.” In 2022, criminal justice and criminology and history major, Veronica Kaemerer, won the Award of Excellence in On-Air Personality Category.
Other students that were submitted these past two years include Andy Burke, Isaiah Calalang, Logan Reed, Mason Leach, Nate Varney, Oliviya Coon, Ricky Simpson, Tahlia Walton and Wish Read.
For more information about the BEA Music Festival, visit www.beaweb.org/festival.
For more information about WKWC 90.3 and Kentucky Wesleyan College’s communication arts and other programs, please visit www.kwc.edu.