- Connelly Award
John & Marilyn Connelly AwardThe honorary John & Marilyn Connelly award is given to the classroom teacher, media specialist, or technology specialist who is deemed by the ISMF Planning Committee to have demonstrated the power of student-produced media. This person has a record of performance in utilizing student-produced media across a variety of disciplines. The award of $1000 and a beautiful trophy is presented at the Festival to the individual selected. |
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| 2008 | 2007 | 2006 | 2005 |
2009 Recipient
Joan GobleCannelton Elementary SchoolCannelton, Indiana
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| Joan Goble is a 30 year veteran teacher at Cannelton Elementary School in Cannelton, Indiana. She has always been interested in media, and in 1996 decided to start an after school Media Club at her school. Since then the Cannelton Elementary Media Club has produced award winning websites each year. The reason why websites are their media of choice is because it allows them to share their work with people from around the world. Joan feels that the world is our classroom and her students speak all of the languages of the world. | |
| The club creates their websites by first choosing one topic they want to research. They extensively research it by gathering information from books, magazines, websites, going on field trips, interviewing people, etc. Then they decide on how to organize this information and design the website to best publish this information. It takes most of the school year for this to be accomplished, but the results are definitely worth it. You can view many of these websites by going to the Cannelton Elementary website at www.siec.k12.in.us/cannelton/elementary/technology/internet/index.htm. | |
| Joan’s media students have presented their projects to other students many times at the Indiana State Capitol building at an event known as “Rotunda Day”. You can view photos of their experiences there at: www.siec.k12.in.us/cannelton/elementary/technology/buddy/index.htm. | |
| At ISMF 2007 Joan was the recipient of the Carl F. and Viola V. Mahnke Award. Other awards Joan has earned include Global SchoolNet’s Online Shared Learning Award 2004, Indiana Distance Learning Teacher of the Year 2003, Fulbright Memorial Fund Scholarship to Japan 2003, Indiana Computer Teacher of the Year 2000, Tech Corps Leadership in the Classroom Award 2000, and Teacher of the Year of Perry County, Indiana 1997. | |
| Joan has long been an advocate for online collaboration. She collaborated with several teachers over the years from other countries in online projects. Three of these, which have been awarded many International awards, she designed with a teacher from The Netherlands, Rene de Vries. These awards include ChildNet International (1998 and 2001), and Global SchoolNet Cyberfair (several awards in the past ten years). One project in particular, TENAN – The Endangered Animals of the World, gave Joan’s students the chance to travel to Eastbourne, UK to present at the Millennium International Children’s Conference on the Environment! It was sponsored by the United Nations Environmental Program. Joan and nine of her students met up with Rene de Vries and eleven of his students to co-present TENAN to an audience of nearly 1000 students from nearly 100 countries around the world! “This just proves that the Internet has made the world our classroom!” You can view photos of this event at: www.tenan.vuurwerk.nl/micc1.htm. | |
| Joan has been involved in many professional organizations of the years including ISTE, GET (Global Educator Team – www.get.vuurwerk.nl/ ), Indiana Computer Educators, and was an Indiana Tech Associate for many years in the late 90’s and early 2000’s. Her experiences with online education also gave her the opportunity to do presentations about online collaboration to teacher audiences in Copenhagen, Denmark; Tianjin, China; and Brighton, UK. | |
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Upon hearing she had won the International Student Media Festival Connelly Award, Joan said, “This is a huge honor! It really is the highlight of my career. I believe that it is great that International Student Media Festival honors teachers who integrate media and technology in their teaching because it is such an important part of our everyday lives. Students should be given the opportunity to utilize and learn from media and technology in a collaborative way in order to have the skills needed to be successful in the global society we live in. Thank you, ISMF, for giving students the opportunity to share and learn from each other about different forms of media. I look forward to being a part of ISMF for many years to come!” |
2008 Recipient
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Brenda CoeOoltewah High SchoolChattanooga, TN |
| Brenda Coe is the 2008 recipient of the Connelly Award. Mrs. Coe teaches in the gifted program at Ooltewah High School in Chattanooga, Tennessee. A long time proponent of media infusion, Mrs. Coe began applying available technology in the 1960’s, using an open reel, black and white video recorder. Today, Macs and imovie software number among her favorite teaching tools. | |
| With project based learning at the heart of her teaching initiatives, Mrs. Coe coaches her students through the rigorous processes of researching, writing, interviewing, art design, composition and technology skills. She reports that her students become so engaged in the process that they often choose to come into the classroom before and after school in order to work on their projects. Their dedication to excellence, inspired by Mrs. Coe’s teaching, is evidenced by fifteen years of ISMF participation and more than 35 winning student entries. | |
| A “can do” teacher, Mrs. Coe has written and received several grants in order to make technology more available to her students. She has also forged innovative cooperative programs with agencies such as the public library system. She is dedicated to student participation in the International Student Media Festival, and has been bringing groups of students to the festival since 1993. She reports many hours dedicated to unloading and dispersing cookie dough and candles, collecting donations and organizing fundraising drives, in order to garner the funds necessary for her students to travel to and participate in the festival. “It’s very important to me for my students to experience the festival, and to receive their award in person,” Mrs. Coe commented. | |
2007 Recipient
Jeff RudkinLora Batchelor Middle SchoolBloomington, Indiana
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 Marilyn Connelly Presents Award |
| Jeff Rudkin created the BTV program at Lora Batchelor Middle School in 1995 as an extension of his video production elective class. In those 12 years, hundreds of students from elementary through high school have received countless awards for a wide range of projects and productions. | |
| Jeff inspires students to produce works covering a wide range of topics and curricular areas. The largest scale productions have been feature-length videos of classic literature including Frankenstein, Tom Sawyer, and Oliver Twist. Students read the original classics, wrote screen plays, created costumes, found shooting locations, acted, filmed, produced, and edited. These productions tied language arts standards into projects that students loved to participate in. World premier screenings at the local theater complete with limousine arrivals and red carpets were great motivators for students. The list of participants in Oliver Twist was well over 100. | |
| Historical events tied to real experiences are also key elements of BTV projects. Students under Jeff’s instruction interviewed dozens of local World War II veterans, compiling over 9 hours of documentary footage which was submitted to the Library of Congress as part of the national Veterans Oral History Project. Students also published a book, A Time for Heroes, documenting these veterans’ experiences. This book was an enormous accomplishment and serves as a testament to the service of these veterans. | |
| BTV students have also focused on the holocaust. Working with a local holocaust survivor, they created several documentaries on the events of the holocaust, brought her as a speaker to the entire school community, and accompanied her to Poland in 2005 to mark the 60th anniversary of the liberation of the camp where she was interned, Auschwitz. Jeff also led a return trip to Auschwitz in 2010. The personal experiences of those who participated in that trip along with the documentary they created have impacted hundreds of students in Monroe County. | |
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| Jeff encourages his students to study areas of interest to themselves and the community. Recent projects that have been recognized through awards from CSPAN and the National School Board Association included topics such as No Child Left Behind legislation and creationism verses evolution. These middle school students interviewed experts, thought critically about the subjects, and produced well-balanced and thoughtful films on controversial and sophisticated topics. | |
| Jeff is untiring in his dedication to BTV. He spends countless hours after school and on weekends providing a space for students to meet and work on projects. BTV was most recently recognized with over 20 winning entries in the 2007 International Student Media Festival – a record number for this school. He has successfully organized students and parents to raise funds each year to take 25-30 students to the ISMF to attand workshops and receive well-earned recognition for their work. He also has taken students to visit several colleges and film schools to promote further study in this field. Several BTV alums are currently pursuing study in telecommunications and film production due directly to Jeff’s inspiration and guidance. | |
| In November, 2008, Jeff Rudkin was one of two teachers in Indiana to receive the National Educator Award from the Milken Family Foundation for his service and great example to educators and students. Teacher Magazine calls this distinguished award the “Oscar of Teaching”. Jeff received his surprise award at a big assembly with the entire student body and staff of the Batchelor Middle School in attendance. He feels this award is a reflection of his students’ work over the past year and the awards his class has won in the past three months. They had 21 winning projects at the International Student Media Festival alone. | |
2006 Recipient
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Deborah HargrovesWindsor Forest Elementary SchoolSavannah, GA |
| Deborah has been involved with helping students produce media projects since the very beginning of ISMF in the mid-seventies. Her early “high-tech” student entries included very innovative “film strips”! Over the years Deborah has been responsible for helping students and teachers produce hundreds, if not thousands, of quality media projects from picture storybooks to electronic picture books; from filmstrips to high quality live-action videos; from sequential stills to high-quality animated movies; from photo-essays from film to digital photography; and from radio shows to websites! | |
| Sally Watson, the 2005 Connelly Award recipient reflects: “Deborah’s 30-year career as an educator has included teaching handicapped students, Media Specialist, Technology Specialist, staff-development instructor, state and international workshop presenter, ISMF judge and steering committee member, and mentor to many teachers in the area of student media production. In 1993, when I first worked on staff with Deborah, I never would have believed that I could help students produce media projects! I didn’t own a computer and was afraid of even turning one on at that point! Through taking workshops taught by Deborah and with much encouragement and help from Deborah, I began my journey of Media Festival Madness! In 1997, even after I returned to teaching the gifted at a different school than Deborah, she was still always available to “walk” me through tough media production problems over the phone! She encouraged me to become a local, district, state, and international media festival judge. She even convinced me to accompany her to Bloomington to judge ISMF projects a few years ago. Deb has been my greatest mentor in media—she is personally responsible for creating the ‘ISMF Monster’ that I am today!” | |
| John and Marilyn Connelly, for whom this award is named, have had the pleasure to work with Deborah for many years. John describes Deborah Hargroves in baseball terms: | |
| A truly great baseball player is sometimes called a ’5 tool player’, meaning they can hit for power, hit for average, field without error, throw with speed and accuracy, and run fast and smart.
In our field of student media production Deborah is at least a 5 tool player. |
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Deborah has set a high bar of standards for those of us wishing to encourage young people to create and communicate using a variety of media. In our field, Deborah is no doubt a future hall-of-famer!”
Deborah shares, “I have experienced many triumphs in working with children in the classroom and media center, but all of them involve a person’s discovery of the joy of learning.” Deborah Hargroves has met this goal in her career many times with the students she has touched personally. Her willingness to share her knowledge and expertise with teachers, who have in turn passed the joy along to hundreds of students and colleagues, has served to extend her influence to countless students and teachers over the years. |
2005 Recipient
Sally WatsonHeard Elementary AcademySavannah, GA |
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| Twenty-four year veteran teacher, Sally Watson, has helped gifted elementary students in three elementary schools to produce Media Festival Projects since 1997. Her students have produced winning projects in a variety of categories: Picture Storybooks, Sequential Stills, Electronic Books, and most recently Web Sites. Not only has Mrs. Watson taught in two Needs Improvement Schools with limited resources, but she has willingly shared her successful teaching strategies with teachers in our district, state, and internationally at ISMF conference in Chicago. She presented workshops during the 2005 Festival in Orlando and will again present for the 2006 Festival in Dallas. | |
| Before joining the staff of Heard Elementary Academy, Mrs. Watson helped students produce in excess of 40 web sites, 10 electronic books or Sequential Stills projects, and dozens of Picture Storybooks, many of which won Media Festival honors at local, county, state, and international levels of ISMF competitions. She planned trips and traveled with parents and international winning students to Dallas, Anaheim, and Chicago. She has been nicknamed “Media Festival Queen” by some of her colleagues! Her students have been featured on two local television stations for three consecutive years, highlighting their ISMF awards and showing Watson and her students presenting workshops to students from other schools. The other schools’ students produced web pages for ISMF, a few of which won International honors. Watson was present in Anaheim to celebrate the winning web pages of students from other schools she and her students shared their Media Festival madness with! | |
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Watson began teaching a new group of students this year and has successfully guided new students and teachers in creating 23 websites, all of which were judged during the 2005 ISMF judging. She has, as always, tied Media Festival to the curriculum, always having students produce projects in the instructional category. Our school is a Core Knowledge site, so all of the 23 projects were student-chosen from a list of Core Knowledge topics for their grade level. She has intricately woven her gifted teaching strands of research, communication, creative and critical thinking skills, creativity, and technology into Media Festival projects. She even teaches non-gifted students Media Festival Madness in the Enrichment After school program at our school. Incidentally, two Georgia State web page winners were produced in this year’s after school program. |
| Watson is such a huge proponent of the International Media Festival program that she often recruits other teachers to become judges at the local, county, state, and even international festivals. She even flew to Bloomington for the 2004 International Judging. Most recently, she has become a member of the ISMF steering committee. The difference that Mrs. Watson has made in our school is tremendous and her efforts are noted by teachers, parents and students. She is truly a worthy recipient of the very first Connelly Award. | |
