University of Northampton students score big with double win at national journalism awards

Student journalists from the University of Northampton have celebrated a major double victory at this year’s Broadcast Journalism Training Council (BJTC) Awards, bringing home two national honours.

Judged by industry leaders and recognising the best of UK journalism training, the BJTC Awards were held on 20 November at Bauer Media in London. From more than 170 submissions across the country, two University of Northampton entries claimed top prizes.

The first award went to Sophie Smith, who graduated this month in Multimedia Sports Journalism. Sophie won ‘Best TV Sport Journalism’ for her powerful documentary exploring double above-knee amputee snowboarders and their campaign for a dedicated classification at the Winter Paralympics.

Adrian Warner, Course Leader for Multimedia Sports Journalism and Sophie’s project supervisor, said: “We are immensely proud of Sophie. It was a superb, original documentary beautifully filmed and edited with fabulous interviews. The award was well-deserved. Sophie has a very bright future ahead of her and we wish her well.”

The second win of the night came in the ‘Best Radio Newsday’ category, awarded to a team of second-year Multimedia Journalism students. Working in partnership with NLive Radio, the team produced in-depth, real-time coverage of the West Northamptonshire Council elections in May 2025.

This marks the second major award for the students’ innovative election reporting, following their Gold Award for ‘Best Political and Election Coverage’ at last month’s Community Radio Awards.

One of the students involved was Justine Larter, who said: “Winning a second award for our local election special was amazing and really cemented that we did a great job. It means a lot to know that big names and other professionals in industry have seen our award-winning work and recognise it as such!

“Working on the programme was amazing. The busy atmosphere and unpredictability of what would happen next in the results was just brilliant. I am interested in going into political journalism after University so it was a great opportunity to put myself out there at a momentous election count.”

The winning students photographed at the awards ceremony on 20 November 2025.

The coverage was organised by Course Leader for Multimedia Journalism, Kate Ironside, alongside Senior Lecturer Hilary Scott and NLive Radio Station Manager Rebecca Steers.

Kate said: ” This is a tremendous achievement for the students – they showed real flair and imagination, tackling the winning and losing politicians on all the important questions. Their comprehensive coverage of the results, broadcast on NLive Radio, provided a real public service to the people of Northampton. It’s wonderful to have such work recognised. We are very proud of the students.”

Rebecca Steers added: “It’s fantastic to see the students win another award for all their hard work providing coverage of a momentous point in our local politics. It really demonstrates the benefit of our partnership with the University’s Journalism course, providing industry experience to upcoming journalists, as well as providing award winning journalism to our audience.”

All finalist entries from this year’s BJTC Awards – including both University of Northampton-winning pieces – are available to view on the BJTC website.

Find out more about studying Multimedia Journalism and Multimedia Sports Journalism at the University of Northampton.