VARIOUS CONTRIBUTIONS and articles of Ateneo student journalists were recognized for their excellence in student journalism during the 16th Raul L. Locsin Awards.
The students were awarded for their respective efforts in campus journalism during the awarding ceremony held at the Communication Department Studio on April 22.
The award was named after outstanding journalist and Ateneo alumnus Raul L. Locsin, who founded the first Southeast Asian daily business newspaper, BusinessWorld. Locsin was also the first Filipino to receive the Ramon Magsaysay Award for Journalism in 1999.
Undergraduate campus journalists were allowed to submit up to three entries for each category. These were News, Features, Editorial Opinion, Explanatory Journalism, Investigative Journalism, and Photojournalism.
All entries were examined by a board of judges based on a specific set of criteria and on the articles’ social impact.
Recognizing excellence
Junior Janine Peralta was awarded for her news article, “OSA Deliberates on Emergence of Faith-Based Groups,” which discussed the push of non-Catholic organizations for their respective accreditations. The article was published in The GUIDON in November 2015.
The article looked into the grounds necessary for the accreditation of emerging faith-based groups as well as possible contradictions to the Ateneo as a Jesuit-institution.
Peralta discussed how the organizations wanted official accreditation so that they may represent their own faiths on campus.
Meanwhile, senior Ishbelle Bongato and junior Tricia Lao won the Features category for their article “@Caricatures of Manila” published in The GUIDON in January 2015.
The article discussed the trend of various Filipino archetypes as demonstrated on twitter and other social media outlets.
Bongato and Lao explained how the various subcultures presented in the trending tweets and one-liner jokes reflected Filipino humor and the uniqueness of the daily quirks present in our culture.
The awards also recognized senior Eugene Ong for his editorial “Base Politics” for the Opinion category published in The GUIDON in November 2015.
Ong’s article discussed the negative aspect of allowing preconceived ideas of current problems that lead to the overwhelming discussion of politics through frustration and anger.
He explained that the citizen’s tendency to fixate on the negative aspects of politics only adds to the pre-existing problems of the country.
“While problems abound in our society—problems that test our patience—we cannot succumb to base bashing. Doing so will only worsen our problems,” Ong explained in his article.
On the other hand, junior Vicah Villanueva was awarded for her investigative article, “Voices Unheard” published in The GUIDON in March 2015.
Villanueva discussed the troubles of one female student who experienced sexual assault at the hands of a fellow Atenean.
In her article, Villanueva wrote about how current laws and systems could turn against several victims whose “voices have been ignored.” She explained that privileging the voice of the victim rather than that of the abuser would help solve such issues.
Finally, senior Regine Cabato and junior Janelle Paris were recognized for their Explanatory article titled “The Exodus Next Door” published in The GUIDON in November 2015.
Cabato and Paris’s article tackled the displacement of several families in Mindanao who were forced to move to evacuation centers and other sites because of “armed conflicts, human rights violations and natural disasters” that they had to face in their original homes.
Locsin scholarship recipient
Along with the recognitions and awards for various aspects of student journalism, the Communication Department also presented this year’s recipient for the Raul L. Locsin Scholarship in Journalism.
The Communication Department explained that the scholarship is given to those who wish to “pursue programs relevant to future careers in journalism” amongst juniors and seniors of the Loyola Schools of Humanities and the Social Sciences. It provides a tuition-and-fees scholarship, partial or full.
This year’s recipient was management engineering and communications senior Faith Decangchon.
She explained how she nearly didn’t qualify for the scholarship as she had limited articles that were qualified for submission.
However, one of the articles she had written for The GUIDON Sports section—an article that covered college volleyball, published in the publication’s January-March 2015 issue—made it within the necessary time frame for the application.
During her acceptance speech, Decangchon explained the struggles she faced in the process of applying.
“So sabi ko, hindi ako matutulog at gagawin ko lahat nung requirements. So hindi nga ako natulog [I said, I won’t sleep and I’ll do all of the requirements. So I didn’t sleep at all.],” she said. “I did my personal essay on the crossroads between traditional media and new media.”
She also explained that at the time of the application, she was experiencing uncertainty with regard to financing her tuition.
“At that time, I was really hanging by a thread and I was [uncertain whether] I had to do [tutoring or even work],” she explained.
She added that she felt surprised that she was awarded for her journalism, but nonetheless felt grateful for the Communication Department and the organizing body of the awarding ceremony.
Editor’s note: Eugene Ong is The GUIDON’s Inquiry Editor. Vicah Villanueva is a member of the Inquiry staff. Regine Cabato and Janelle Paris are members of the Beyond Loyola Staff. Ishbelle Bongato and Patricia Lao are members of the Features staff. Janine Peralta is a member of the News staff. Faith Decangchon was a Sports staffer last academic year.
