Foster wins 2024 adviser scholarship

Pitt Media adviser Nicole Foster from Pittsburgh High School earned the 2024 Lester Benz Scholarship from Quill and Scroll.

Foster will use the money from the scholarship to attend this summer’s SNO Adviser Academy to refresh her website skills.

“Her passion for journalism and education clearly run deep and it was clear from her application that she would use what she learned at the SNO Adviser Academy to directly help her students improve their publication,” said Lori Keekley, NSPA associate director for Quill and Scroll. “Quill and Scroll is proud to name Nicole Foster as this year’s scholarship recipient.”

She said she is excited to be formally trained on using a SNO site and looks forward to bringing those skills back to her students.

“When the old editors were leaving, we just didn’t get everyone fully trained in it so we’ve all kind of fumbled through it for the last two years,” Foster said. “I know our students want to revamp it. They have goals.”

Foster oversees a wide range of media at Pittsburgh High School including a newspaper, website, yearbook, social media sites and video products. Though she worked as an English teacher and ESL coordinator before becoming a media adviser, Foster’s roots in journalism trace back to high school.

She worked as a reporter and photographer in high school and initially pursued journalism in college and was the editor of her college paper. After a few years using her journalism skills as an ESL coordinator, Foster made the move back to teaching. While working at a middle school her principal asked if she would be open to running a yearbook class and Foster readily agreed.

“I had never done yearbook before, but I knew the concepts of writing good stories, interviewing and photography, which is my love,” Foster said.

In 2022 Foster made the move to the high school and has been busy ever since. Returning to journalism as an adviser was special for Foster because journalism has been in her heart since high school, she said.

One of the things Foster enjoys most about being a media adviser is the constantly evolving nature of journalism.

“I’ve seen media churn in 30 years, and now we’re dealing with AI. In the last year I’ve been asking journalists [about AI] and they’re like, ‘see what the other journalists are doing,’” Foster said.