NEWS
NORMAN, OKLA. – The University of Oklahoma’s Gaylord College of Journalism and Mass Communication, which was recently rated No. 1 program by the Broadcast Educators Association, continues its path of excellence after earning six total awards and more than a third of all nominations from the National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences 2025 Heartland Emmys Student Production Awards.
Gaylord College students, faculty and alumni comprised 20 of the total 57 nominations in this student competition, which honors excellence in categories including News, Sports, Narrative, Promotional and Documentary production. This is a regional competition of the well-known Emmy Awards that recognize and celebrate excellence in television. Half of the awards won during the 2025 ceremony were garnered by Gaylord Hall Productions students, the college's contract production unit.
“It's incredible to see how Gaylord students’ work is able to compete with some of the best schools in the country,” said Scott Hodgson, Gaylord Family Research Professor. “Many of our awards were for work for actual clients. Our students are able to recognize that what they do can impact others and really invest in that storytelling.”
“A Film About Toby,” which earned the award for Best Long-Form Fiction, was produced by students in the fall 2024 Creative Media Production capstone course and recently also took home top honors at the Broadcast Education Association Festival of Media Arts.
“We’re so proud of our multi-talented students,” said Andrea Miller, dean of Gaylord College. “They are not only learning industry and professional skills at Gaylord, but they are executing them at an award-winning level. Emmys are a big deal, and we are so proud of their hard work."
The Heartland Emmy Awards are a regional branch of the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences. NATAS was founded in 1947 as a nonprofit organization dedicated to recognizing outstanding achievement in broadcasting. The Heartland Chapter includes the states of Wyoming, Colorado, Nebraska, Kansas and Oklahoma.
2025 Heartland Emmy Winners
About the University of Oklahoma
Founded in 1890, the University of Oklahoma is a public research university located in Norman, Oklahoma. As the state’s flagship university, OU serves the educational, cultural, economic and health care needs of the state, region and nation. For more information about the university, visit www.ou.edu.
Over four weeks this summer, teams of incoming engineering students designed mobility devices for Duck, a young rescue dog born without a front leg. Students in OU’s Engineering Summer Bridge program designed and prototyped mobility devices tailored to Duck’s needs, using CAD software, electronics and 3D printing while applying the engineering design process to a real engineering problem.
University of Oklahoma researcher Keenan Greyslak, Ph.D., has long been interested in how a mother’s diet during pregnancy and lactation may influence a child’s risk of developing metabolic diseases earlier and more severely as they age. With a new grant from the National Institutes of Health, he is furthering his investigations while taking another step toward a career in academic biomedical research.
Zhenghong Tang, Ph.D., has been named chair of the Department of Geography and Environmental Sustainability in the University of Oklahoma’s College of Geographic and Atmospheric Sciences. A leader in the field of planning, Tang will oversee the department and its mission of creating a community of interdisciplinary scholars and experts who aim to better understand the Earth’s human-natural systems.
