The Walter Cronkite College Council hosted their first event, Cronkite Night at the Rooftop, at the Sun Devil Fitness Complex on Thursday night honoring and celebrating Walter Cronkite School student organizations and student leaders.
The council presented three awards at the event, recognizing a leader, organization and student organization adviser who promoted student engagement, was highly involved and represented what the Cronkite School stands for.
Robert Soares, president of the Cronkite School chapter of the National Lesbian and Gay Journalists Association, won the Cronkite Student Leader Award as a student who creates an environment in which all participants feel welcomed, respected and valued.
“I am really honored to receive the student leadership award because when I started this year as president of NLGJA, I knew that I wanted us to do things that we had never done before and push to do great things and increase student engagement and come up with events and things outside the box,” Soares said. “This award really is kind of an ode to everyone who has helped me get to where I am now and I couldn’t have done it without the amazing people at Cronkite.”
NLGJA received the Cronkite Student Organization Award for encouraging student engagement, professional opportunities and high involvement in the community.
Garrett Mitchell, secretary of NLGJA, said it was great to be recognized.
“We’ve done a lot of work this year especially, we’ve grown exponentially as a club and it’s nice to see we’re being rewarded for that, although we didn’t do it with intentions of getting an award,” he said. “Hopefully we can continue to make a difference on this campus and expand outward.“
Mary Cook, the adviser for the Cronkite Village residential community, was recognized with the Cronkite Adviser Award as an adviser who has provided insight, is personally and professionally invested, meets the needs of the students and continually attempts to improve the organization.
“It’s nice that students nominated us,” she said. “Of course there were a lot of very deserving people here tonight who do so much with their organizations and they probably could have given out ten awards.”
WCCC President Alexis Kramer said the council wanted to host the event to honor Cronkite School students, organizations and the leaders guiding them.
“Everyone deserves a moment to feel appreciated and to know that their work is being recognized,” Kramer said.
Kramer said she has been impressed by the ideas and drive of Cronkite School students this semester and how they’ve used their resources at the Cronkite School to accomplish things.
Soares, who is also the director of public relations for WCCC, said the event was a great opportunity to close out the year, celebrate students and show them that the council is there as an outlet for support.
Cronkite School students were able to submit nominations for the awards through an online survey.
Soares said they received a great response from students with the survey, especially with Cronkite School student organization advisers, who he said are the backbone of student organizations.
“It was great to see how many students were also voting for student advisers,” Soares said. “To see them vote for advisers and understand and recognize the great faculty and people that we have at the school, that was really cool.”
Kramer and WCCC Vice President Erika Tuerr started the council in January.
Kramer said the event aligns with the main goal of the council to be a channel of support for the student organizations within the Cronkite School.
“The goals that we have are to basically unite student organizations, to provide a resource of help for them when it comes down to funding, increase student membership, put events together, anything that they need to be successful that we’re there as a resource,” Kramer said. “We’re there to help them; we’re going to be the direct connection between student government and between the faculty and staff and administration.”
Editor’s Note: Downtown Devil Education Editor Danika Worthington is vice president of the ASU chapter of the National Lesbian and Gay Journalists Association. She did not contribute to the reporting or writing of this story.
Contact the reporter at Victoria.Fernandez@asu.edu
