The below are remarks from Phoebe Zerwick, Director of the Journalism Program at WFU, on the history of the Bynum Shaw Prize and the students being recognized this year.

The annual journalism award at WFU is named for Bynum Shaw, WFU grad, who worked as a Washington Correspondent, European correspondent and editorial writer for the Baltimore Sun before returning to Wake in 1965 to run the Journalism and Creative Writing Programs. 

“He was smart and skeptical, but never cynical, because he realized the great power of journalism-and journalists-to make the world a better place,” Mike Riley, 1982 alum and then editor at the Roanoke Times said when Bynum died in 2001.

The prize is meant to honor a student who excels in their journalism studies and in student journalism. 

I want to take a minute to speak about the role of an independent student press especially in moments of crisis. From the moment the college decided to suspend campus life during spring break two years ago, the Old Gold & Black staff went to work to publish remotely bringing us timely, up-to-date information about the pandemic and its impact in campus life, even when the administration was slow to communicate. 

These student journalists have not relented. They were there last semester when students protested about sexual assault on campus. It was the OG&B that questioned the early versions of the COVID dashboard. It was the OG&B that exposed short staffing in the counseling office when our students were most in need. And it was the OG&B that wrote about RA’s needing more training to deal with a pandemic. And when the Weaver Fire closed campus early in the spring 2022 semester, I know many of you relied on the OG&B for reliable information.

Last year we honored Rafael Lima (‘21), who wore many editorial hats at the OG&B and was also a Pulitzer fellow and talented student, and Alexandra Karlinchak, editor in chief (‘22). The previous year we honored Elizabeth Maline, the online managing editor at the OG&B,  who was instrumental in the newspaper’s early coverage of the pandemic.

 

In that tradition, the Bynum Shaw award this year goes to Connor McNealy, editor in chief at the OG&B whom many of you know because he is also an English major. In my work as advisor to the OG&B, I have been impressed by his steady hand, mature news judgment, and calm under pressure. Most recently, the OG&B has been writing about the WFU med student who has become the target of right wing hate after she Tweeted about a patient who mocked her ID tag with her pronouns. The OG&B published a news story about this controversy and an opinion column that was favorable to the med student. Since then, McNeely and others at the OG&B have faced criticism from such Tabloids as the Daily Mail and the Tucker Carlson Show, as well as some nasty blowback social media and email. Connor has been unflappable in his support of his staff and of the right to fearlessly report the news and to publish thoughtful opinion. I encourage everyone to read the editorial he and others at the OG&B crafted in defense of civil discourse and join me in congratulating Connor.

 

We are also awarding finalist prizes to two outstanding journalism students: Mingxuan Zhu and Christian Odjakjian.

 

Mingxuan’s professors speak of her fearlessness in her reporting and storytelling. In Professor Barry Yeoman’s Magazine Writing class, she focused her article on a difficult topic: the story of an American educator who moved to China, hit cultural barriers at his school, and eventually had to leave. The resulting piece was well-structured and beautiful. In Professor Weiss’s Audio Storytelling class, she was among the most intrepid, some may say zealous, audio producers, creating over 30 minutes of fun, funny, deep, hard-hitting, and very poignant audio material. She produced a piece about her escapes from kindergarten and an even longer piece about her fearless dives on the frisbee field and the history of Ultimate Frisbee in China. It should surprise no one that Mingxuan has already planned out her next step: the Columbia School of Journalism, which she’ll be attending next fall. 

Sports coverage has always been fundamental to the Old Gold & Black, and covering the school’s men’s basketball team over the last few years has been a challenge and a thrill as a perennial loser transformed under a new coach into a surprising winner this past season. As Justin Catanoso writes, Christian Odjakjian — a sports enthusiast of the highest order — has covered the Deacon’s men’s team with in depth reporting and graceful writing. He has explained clearly how and why the team enjoyed so much success this past season, and when its season largely ended in a unexpected loss to an underdog in the ACC tournament, he held to the standards of independent journalism to again explain why the team was excluded from the NCAA tournament: “A 23-9 record, including a 13-7 mark in ACC play, usually should be plenty for a team in this conference to receive not only a tournament bid, but a good seed. However, a weak non-conference schedule, as well as a down year within the ACC, dissuaded the committee from including Wake Forest over a 17-14 Michigan team, for example.” Christian has had a great run as a sports writer at the OG&B and we’re pleased to recognize his contributions to the paper and the Journalism minor.