Connecticut adviser wins 2020 Benz scholarship
Laura Bowe, The King School
Laura Bowe from The King School earns award
Laura Bowe, the yearbook adviser at the King School in Stamford, Connecticut, has been named the 2020 recipient of the Quill and Scroll Lester G. Benz Scholarship.
Bowe has advised the yearbook for four years and has shown promise as one of country’s best young advisers. She has already earned Certified Journalism Educator recognition from the Journalism Education Association despite not having majored in journalism as a student.
Most importantly, she has reinvigorated journalism at the King School through her yearbook program.
“I have initiated a think tank of colleagues to create a formalized journalism program and have created a three-year strategic plan to build up curriculum, professional development and field experiences,” she wrote in her application. “One of these goals is to revive King School’s Quill and Scroll charter.”
Bowe will use the $500 award to take a Poynter Institute seminar on editorial leadership sometime in the next year.
“Laura Bowe has maintained and even improved the journalistic integrity of the 418-page King School yearbook from the standpoint of both editorial copy and the intense levels of proofreading involved,” wrote Jeffrey Wood, her Walsworth yearbook representative. “Laura provides teaching moments in each yearbook meeting for her editors and has asked many questions along the way of me. She is eager to learn as much as she can and impart it to her staff.”
Who is Eligible?
Quill and Scroll encourages applicants who:
- teach at a Quill and Scroll charter school (check here to see if you are and, if you’re not, how to get a charter),
- have at least one year teaching high school journalism and/or advising publications,
- have a minimum of one year experience teaching journalism or advising school publications,
- plan to return to the high school classroom and media advising next year AND
- will apply the information gained in the course work, seminar or workshop taken as a result of this scholarship.
The scholarship program’s objective is to identify and reward experienced journalism teachers and publication advisers (as defined above) who seek the opportunity to upgrade their journalism skills, teaching methodologies and advising techniques.
What’s required?
Complete the application form below this section, including the requirement that you submit two letters of recommendation from people who will attest to your journalism teaching skill, publication advising, quality of the journalistic writing course(s) you teach and the quality of the publication(s) you advise. The letters of recommendation should come from any of the following sources:
- Superintendent
- Principal
- Vice or Assistant Principal
- Department Chair
- Regional or State Scholastic Press Association Director
- Scholastic Journalism Workshop Director
- A faculty member of the school, college or department of journalism for whom you will take a journalism course
- JEA mentor, current or former
It is the intent to select a journalism teacher/publication adviser who plans to take course work that is definitely beyond the introductory level. Descriptions of courses or workshops should be submitted with the application to help inform the scholarship committee about the plan of study.
The 2021 application deadline is April 30, 2021.
