The prestigious Dateline Awards for excellence in journalism are handed out at the chapter’s annual banquet, usually held in early to mid-June. We need one person to take on the paid, part-time responsibility of soliciting and coordinating entries, collecting entry fees, organizing volunteer judges, processing judges’ choices and announcing competition winners in a news release. Most of the work will take place from January through mid-June.
Duties:
Maintain regular communication with the chapter’s Board of Directors and provide status reports when requested.
Respond to queries from the Board’s designated liaison in a timely manner.
Follow and update, as necessary, the chapter’s contest schedule.
Maintain and update a database of media outlets eligible to submit entries.
Send out contest announcements and solicitation of entries.
Respond to questions from potential entrants and others about contest rules, categories and deadlines.
Receive entries and entry fees.
Encourage entrants to attend the Awards Dinner.
Sort entries by category, maintaining logs to track entries from receipt through judging.
Forward entry fees to the chapter’s treasurer.
Manage the judging process, which includes:
- Arranging a swap of entries with an SPJ chapter in another state, one that conducts a similar competition.
- Providing that chapter with our chapter’s judging criteria, procedural guidance and deadlines.
- Shipping DC-area entries to the other chapter.
- Receiving entries, judging criteria, procedural guidance and deadlines from the other chapter.
- Recruiting local volunteers to judge the entries coming from the other chapter.
- Ensuring that the judging stays on schedule at both chapters.
- Collecting local judges’ award decisions and shipping those choices to the other chapter.
- Receiving from the other chapter its judges’ award decisions for each DC-area category.
- Preparing a comprehensive list of DC-area winners in each category.
- Preparing winners’ certificates in digital form, ready for printing.
Prepare a news release announcing the winners and distribute it to area media outlets.
Prepare a post-mortem report evaluating the contest and recommending procedural improvements. Specifically:
- Evaluate the contest with regard to possible migration to an online judging system
Requirements:
Familiarity with various news media.
Familiarity with Excel or similar database program.
Ability to solve problems and meet deadlines.
Ability to write news releases in proper form.
Ability to write clear reports.
Availability to attend chapter Board meetings as required, evenings, probably three or four times per year.
Availability to attend the chapter’s annual banquet in June, to assist in distributing awards.
A valid Social Security number
Availability to work as needed throughout the year. The work will not be steady. It will be focused from January through mid-June, and the busiest periods will be those near deadlines, when contest entries are arriving and judging packets are being processed. The Contest Coordinator will have great, but not total, flexibility in setting work hours.
Background in competition management is highly desirable.
Compensation: $2500.00, plus reasonable expenses.
Contact: Julie Asher, Chapter President
jasher@spjdc.org
240-460-6612