Bill Bangham - International Mission Board (Photojournalism)
Bill Bangham is a photojournalist and writer with the International Mission Board of the Southern Baptist Convention in Richmond, Va. He serves as the IMB's director of editorial and photography and as the international bureau chief for Baptist Press. Previously, he was editor in chief of the Commission magazine. He has received major awards in writing, photography and design in both secular and religious competitions, including the University of Missouri International Pictures of the Year competition and the National Press Photographers Association Best of Photojournalism competition. Bangham also is a founder of the American Belarussian Relief Organization, a non-profit agency that assists children exposed to radiation from the Chernobyl nuclear disaster.
Adelle M. Banks - Religion News Service (News Writing)
Adelle M. Banks is the senior correspondent at Religion News Service, a Washington-based wire service that covers religion and ethics and whose clients include secular and religious publications. Before coming to RNS in 1995, Adelle worked at the Orlando Sentinel, the Providence Journal and upstate New York newspapers in Syracuse and Binghamton. A native of Newport, R.I., she is a graduate of Mount Holyoke College in South Hadley, Mass. She was a third-place winner in the Religion Newswriters Association's Templeton Religion Reporter of the Year contest in 1997 and was a finalist in 2004 for the same contest. She also has been honored by Associated Church Press, including a first-place award this year in the news story category.
Andrea Burroughs - Freelance designer (Layout & Design)
Andrea Burroughs graduated in 1997 with Highest Honors from the University of Florida in Gainesville, Fla., with a B.S. in Advertising. While there, she was in the UF Honors Program, Golden Key National Honor Society and Alpha Lambda Delta; was a Wentworth Scholar and an Anderson Scholar; and was a recipient of the Gov. R.H. Gore Scholarship and the Graham K. Gloss Scholarship. After graduating she began working for the Florida Baptist Witness, now a bi-weekly tabloid, as Design Editor and Advertising Director. There, she did layout and design; sold and designed ads; and proofread and cut copy. She now works from home, doing layout and design for the Witness, freelances some, and also helps her church with their layout and design needs.
Carolyn Curtis - Writer (Indepth/series)
Carolyn Curtis cut her journalistic teeth at the Associated Press, moved on to daily newspapers, managed communications in two Fortune 50 companies (Alcoa and DEC/Hewlett Packard) and edited magazines for two church denominations (Presbyterians and Southern Baptists). During the 1990s she became known for her reporting from Washington, D.C., on legislation and issues of interest to evangelicals for publications such as Christianity Today, Focus on the Family's Citizen, Christian American, Charisma, etc. She has been in secular publications ranging from Sports Illustrated to the Saturday Evening Post. In 1998 she joined the North American Mission Board as manager of publications, serving as founding editor of On Mission before turning over the reins to the very capable Carol Pipes. The author of six books and editor/consultant for many others, she has won awards from the Wall Street Journal, Society of Professional Journalists, Evangelical Press Association, Baptist Communicators, and others. A former J-school prof herself, she holds a bachelor of journalism degree from the University of Texas at Austin and a master of arts degree in communication from Stephen F. Austin State University. Carolyn loves to travel and recently took her dream trip - the in-residence study program to Oxford, England, concentrating on C.S. Lewis. She even got to stay in his home, The Kilns! Now in Texas to help care for her 93-year-old mother, she is a columnist for the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, and - as time permits - mentors younger journalists, speaks/consults/freelances on assignment and judges contests such as the Christies (Christian fiction) and, of course, the esteemed BP Awards.
Gibbs Frazeur - Photographer (Photojournalism)
Gibbs Frazeur is a freelance photographer based in Georgia. Gibbs' photography career began in1979 while covering assignments as the staff photographer for a daily newspaper in western New York State. In 1985 he made the decision to further his education in the field of photojournalism and enrolled in the graduate program of visual communications at Ohio University in Athens, Ohio.
He worked as a staff photographer with the Evening Observer, the Athens News, and the Shelbyville News. He later served staff photographer internships with Gannett Rochester Newspapers in Rochester, N.Y., and The Courier-Journal in Louisville, Ky. After freelancing for five years in Louisville, Gibbs became the photography department manager and special assignment photographer for the North American Mission Board in Alpharetta, Ga. While in this position for six years, he traveled on assignments throughout North America, including Alaska.
Immediately following the attack on the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001, Gibbs was part of a team that drove straight through to NYC to provide next-day disaster relief photographic coverage (transmitting images for posting on the organization's news website).
Gibbs' work has been published in annual reports, Parade, Sports Spectrum, Worldwide Challenge, Missions Mosaic, On Mission and the Commission. In 2001, he was a contributing photographer to the Commission, which placed second in the POY contest that year. He was also a contributing photographer for the nationally distributed coffee table book - Sunday in America. Gibbs has been a contributing writer to the Christians in Photojournalism quarterly newsletter.
Manny Garcia - El Nuevo Herald (Miami Herald) (Overall Newspaper)
Joni B. Hannigan - Florida Baptist Witness (Competition Coordinator)
Since 2002, Joni B. Hannigan has been managing editor of the weekly Florida Baptist Witness newspaper, a news partner of Baptist Press, for which she has been a national correspondent and column writer. At the Witness, Joni covered the Terri Schiavo case up close from Pinellas Park, Fla., and led coverage of in-depth news writing and photography during Florida's historic 2004-2005 hurricane seasons. In addition, she also covered humanitarian efforts for Iraqi refugees living in Jordan in 2003 and in 2005 traveled to Brazil to cover mission efforts among the Indigenous peoples and those living in remote villages along the Amazon River and its tributaries. A U.S. Navy veteran, Hannigan has written scores of news and feature stories as a freelancer and is an adjunct professor at the University of North Florida. She has taught high school English, journalism and public relations, leading students to produce award-winning newspapers. Interns under her supervision have covered aspects of political elections, the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City and Super Bowls in Jacksonville and Tampa. She has a master's degree in education from Park University in Parkville, Mo., and a bachelor's in education from Hannibal-LaGrange College in Missouri, where she now serves as a trustee. She and her husband, John, have two adult children, a grandson, Joey (3), and a granddaughter, Madelyn (1). Joni is the co-founder of the Baptist Press Excellence in Journalism contest and has been the contest coordinator since 2000. Oh, and you can find her on Facebook and Twitter!
Gary Fong - Genesis Photo Agency (Photojournalism)
Gary Fong most recently was the director of editorial graphics technology at the San Francisco Chronicle. Fong is the principal of Genesis Photo Agency, a group of professional photographers with a dream of elevating the effectiveness of photography in evangelical publications around the world. Fong joined the San Francisco Chronicle in 1975 as a staff photographer, and some of his work has included the 1989 earthquake in San Francisco, the St. Helens Volcano eruption in Washington State, Pope John Paul II's visit to San Francisco in 1988 and the Democratic National Convention in 1984. Fong was a juror for the Pulitzer Prize and has won numerous photography awards.
Jerry Higgins - Freelance Writer (Sports Writing)
Jerry Higgins has been involved in sports media for more than 20 years as a reporter, sports editor, copy editor and professional sports public relations director. A 1984 Northeastern University journalism graduate, Higgins was sports editor of the Gloucester (Mass.) Daily Times for seven years. He had the opportunity to cover the 1986 Boston Red Sox' trip to the World Series as well as the 1986 New England Patriots' first Super Bowl in New Orleans.
But hockey has been Higgins' first love. As a high school sports writer for The Boston Globe while in college, Higgins had the opportunity to cover and name players like Tom Barrasso and Tom Glavine as Globe All-Scholastics. As the pro hockey beat writer for the New Haven (Ct.) Register from 1994-2000, Higgins covered the Hartford Whalers, the American Hockey League and the United Hockey League. He was among the first to report on the Whalers' move to North Carolina (now the Carolina Hurricanes) for The Hockey News as the Whalers' correspondent.
Higgins moved to public relations in December 2000 as he joined the Carolina Hurricanes as their Director of Public and Media Relations. He led the team's on and off-ice PR efforts during the team's first run to the Stanley Cup finals in 2002 as well as the Raleigh arena's naming rights.
For three years, Higgins was the Director of Public Relations for Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary in Wake Forest, N.C. before his position was eliminated in a corporate restructuring. Currently, Higgins is communications officer for the North Carolina Department of Transportation, a freelance writer, PR consultant, and he spends time with his wife, Andrea, and children Alexandra (13) and Andrew (8).
Peter Jacobi - Indiana University (Feature Writing)
Peter Jacobi is an emeritus professor in the School of Journalism at Indiana University and former professor and associate dean of the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University.
He received his B.S. and M.S. degrees in journalism from Northwestern.
His professional journalistic background spreads across print and broadcast fields: as arts critic and writer for various newspapers, including the Chicago Daily News, the Christian Science Monitor, and the Hollister Newspaper chain in north suburban Chicago; as editor of a magazine, The Music Magazine/Musical Courier, and freelance writer for others; as news writer, assignment editor, and on-air reporter for radio and television, including ABC and NBC News. Jacobi's professional experience also includes the vice presidency of Jack Hilton, Inc., a New York media training and speech coaching firm, and he continues to consult with corporate and institutional clients on communications issues and skills.
He currently serves as music columnist and critic for the Bloomington Herald-Times, for which in recent years he won five consecutive first place recognitions from the Indiana Chapter, Society of Professional Journalists. He also writes a monthly column for the professional newsletter, Editors Only.
Among his publications are: The Messiah Book: The Life and Times of G.F. Handel's Greatest Hit; Writing with Style: The News Story and the Feature; Straight Talk about Videoconferencing, and The Magazine Article: How to Think It, Plan It, Write It. His work has appeared in numerous publications, and he provided major contributions to The Lyric Opera Companion: The History, Lore, and Stories of the World's Greatest Operas and From Budapest to Bloomington, Janos Starker and the Hungarian Cello Tradition.
Jacobi received the Gretchen A. Kemp Teaching Fellowship from the IU School of Journalism and the Northwestern University Top Teaching Award. He is a charter member, Hall of Achievement, Medill School of Journalism, Northwestern University, and was the first recipient, Arts Advocate Award, Bloomington Area Arts Commission.
He continues to teach arts criticism and reporting and magazine reporting for the School of Journalism.
Jim Jones - Fort Worth Star-Telegram (Editorial and Column Writing)
Jim Jones is a veteran writer who continues to contribute columns to the Fort Worth Star-Telegram and free-lances for other publications, including Christianity Today. Including the Kennedy assassination in 1963, Jones has covered earthquakes, hurricanes, major trials and interviewed a variety of religious figures from Billy Graham to Jerry Falwell to the Dalai Lama.
In 1999 Jones wrote some of the main stories on the tragic shootings at the Wedgwood Baptist Church in Fort Worth. Before the pope's visit, Jones joined other religion writers in participating in two Religion and Media 2000 seminars, the first in Rome and another in Israel. A religion writer since 1978, Jones has covered the modern-day Southern Baptist conflicts and followed the pope throughout the U.S. and in Central America, Mexico and, most recently, in Israel and Jordan.
Jones holds a bachelor's degree in journalism from the University of North Texas and a master's in English from Texas Christian University. His religion studies include a five-month program at the University of North Carolina under a Rockefeller Foundation fellowship. In 1999 he studied church history at Oxford University in England and in 1991-92 served as president of the Religion Newswriters Association.
Stephen King - The Washington Post (World Wide Web)
Steven King is the director of innovations for The Washington Post where he leads a team of developers and editors to produce new and creative ways to tell stories on multiple devices and platforms. He was also a multimedia editor and producer for The Post and MSNBC.com before he and his wife served for two years as overseas correspondents working in more than 20 countries across the globe.
King is currently working on his Master's degree in Internet communications from The University of Liverpool and he previously received his undergraduate degree in journalism from Western Kentucky University. He and his wife Amy live in Arlington, Va. are expecting their first child in March.
Michael A. Longinow - Biola University (Cartoons, graphics, writing)
Michael Longinow grew up in Ernest Hemingway's hometown of Oak Park, Ill., reared by Mexican and Ukrainian parents. He attended the same high school Hemingway attended, serving, as did Hemingway, on that school's newspaper -- though not as a writer. Longinow did editorial cartoons, a tradition he continued through college. Longinow's first mass media experience was in his pre-teen years, rolling small weekly newspapers and flinging them onto front porches in his neighborhood near Chicago's western edge. He eventually graduated to the much-heftier Chicago Tribune and Chicago Sun-Times, papers for which, later in life, he wrote freelance sports and features.
Gustav Niebuhr - Syracuse University (News Writing)
Gustav Niebuhr is associate professor of religion and the media at Syracuse University, based in the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications, with an appointment in the College of Arts and Science's Religion Department. He is director of the Religion & Society Program, and founding director of the Carnegie Religion and Media Program.
In 2002-03, he was scholar-in-residence at Princeton University's Center for the Study of Religion. Previously, he worked as a reporter at The New York Times and, earlier, at The Washington Post and The Wall Street Journal. He is author of Beyond Tolerance: Searching for Interfaith Understanding in America (Viking, 2008) and contributes to the "On Faith" blog at www.washingtonpost.com and www.newsweek.com .
Carol Pipes - On Mission (Overall Yearbook)
Carol Pipes is director of Publications and editor of On Mission magazine, the flagship publication of the North American Mission Board (NAMB). NAMB is the domestic missions agency of the Southern Baptist Convention. Carol joined the On Mission staff in 2001. Prior to joining On Mission, she served as public relations manager for the Salvation Army's Fort Worth Area Command. She serves on the board of directors of the Evangelical Press Association, an organization serving journalists in Christian publishing.
Jennifer Davis Rash - The Alabama Baptist (Feature Writing)
Jennifer Davis Rash is managing editor of the Alabama Baptist newspaper since 1996. She is an honors graduate from The University of Alabama with a bachelor's degree in journalism (1993). She earned a master's of theological studies from Beeson Divinity School at Samford University in Birmingham in 2007. A member of several national press associations, Rash has earned numerous national news writing, feature writing and broadcast awards. She is currently president of Baptist Communicators Association.
Todd Starnes - Fox News Radio (Broadcast)
Todd Starnes is a network news anchor and reporter for Fox News Radio based in New York City. He was one of the network's primary reporters for the 2008 presidential campaign -- mostly covering then-Sen. Barack Obama. Among his most recent assignments are the 2008 Democratic Convention and the 500-year floods in the Midwest. He's anchored coverage of Saddam Hussein's execution, the death of former President Ford and the night Paris Hilton was released from the slammer. Todd also covers pop culture events ranging from the World Championship Barbecue Festival in Memphis to Comic-Con in San Diego. He is the winner of an Edward R. Murrow Award for excellence in journalism and an Associated Press Mark Twain Award for excellence in storytelling. He writes a daily blog on foxnewsradio.com and hosts a bi-weekly podcast called "FOX on Faith." Todd is an avid long-distance runner. He's completed two full marathons -- most recently the New York City Marathon. In 2008 he ran the Music City Half Marathon in Nashville. He is a member of the New York Metropolitan Museum of Art and the New York Road Runners. Todd worships at The Journey, a Southern Baptist congregation that meets in midtown Manhattan. As a native southerner living in the north, Todd is on a never-ending search for sweet tea, biscuits and good barbecue in the Big Apple.
Gregory Tomlin - University of North Texas (Overall Newspaper)
Gregory Tomlin is director of marketing, news and information at the University of North Texas, Dallas Campus. He was previously a national correspondent with Baptist Press and director of communications and public relations Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Fort Worth, Texas. Tomlin attended the University of Arkansas at Little Rock, where he earned a bachelor of arts degree in history and English. He received a master of arts and a Ph.D. in church history and theology from Southwestern Seminary. He also has studied at Boston University's Institute on Culture, Religion and World Affairs. Tomlin holds a Ph.D. in church history and also teaches courses for Liberty Theological Seminary in Lynchburg, Va.
Karen Willoughby - Louisiana Baptist Message (Individual Yearbook)
Karen Willoughby is managing editor of the Louisiana Baptist Message and the Dakota Baptist newspapers. Her 25-year career in journalism includes stints at the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, New York City's Metro Christian News and Beacon Christian News, and the Northwest Baptist Witness. She also is a frequent contributor to Baptist Press and would be glad to advise students about internships.
