Faiz Siddiqui places fifth in Hearst sports writing competition

Thursday, February 20, 2014 - 6:00pm
Faiz Siddiqui placed fifth in the Hearst sports writing competition for his story titled, "Astronomical Odds." He wins a $1,000 scholarship and the University of Nebraska-Lincoln College of Journalism and Mass Communications will receive a matching grant. A record 111 entries from 60 schools were received in this competition, in which 105 undergraduate journalism programs at universities across the nation are eligible to participate. University of Nebraska–Lincoln is tenth overall in the Intercollegiate Writing Competition.

Siddiqui's story is about a 16-year-old whose Major League Baseball dream went awry after three wild pitches. Siddiqui's reporting came out of depth-reporting trip to the Dominican Republic during the holiday break.


In June 2013 Siddiqui competed alongside seven other student journalists from across the country at the Hearst National Writing Championships in San Francisco, Calif.  He is a junior journalism student from Cincinnati, Ohio. He is a recipient of the Harold and Marian Andersen Honors Scholarship. Siddiqui occasionally can be found writing pointed social commentary for the Huffington Post, or compiling top 10 lists about rap music for Complex Magazine. He has had internships at the Lincoln Journal Star and the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette. Siddiqui is an Omaha World-Herald fellow this semester and will head to Boston, Mass., this summer for an internship with the Boston Globe.

The Hearst Journalism Awards Program is conducted under the auspices of accredited schools of the Association of Schools of Journalism and Mass Communication and fully funded and administered by the William Randolph Hearst Foundation.  The 14 monthly competitions consist of five writing, two photojournalism, one radio, two TV and four multimedia competitions, with Championship finals in all divisions.  The program awards up to $500,000 in scholarships and grants annually.
 
Judging the writing competitions this year are:  Marty Kaiser, Editor and Senior Vice President, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel; Mike Leary, Senior Vice President and Editor, San Antonio Express-News; and John Temple, Senior Fellow, John S. Knight Journalism Fellowships Program, Stanford University, Calif.