The National Student Media Contests were all completed online and on site for the 2023 Fall JEA/NSPA National High School Journalism Convention in Boston.

In all, 1,453 students competed in photo, broadcast, graphic design, literary magazine, design and writing contests.

There were 601 students recognized with 92 superior, 183 excellent and 326 honorable mention awards.

All the competitors had their submissions assessed by teams of judges. Those who competed in contests with online submissions have critiques available on the NSMC website. Contestants can log in with their username and password to view their critiques. Those who competed onsite received critique sheets with feedback at the awards ceremony.

Anyone who was not able to stay for the awards ceremony will have their critiques and any awards they may have won mailed to them later this month.

Judges shared some of their thoughts about what some of the strengths were in the category and what are some general areas to look to improve in the future. The contest prompts and the critiques are great resources for classroom lessons and preparation for future contests.

In addition, through SmugMug students and advisers can view thousands of photos from JEA photo contests in each of the nine categories. The site houses all of the photos that have been recognized in past conventions so users can learn from those student photographers.

SmugMug has an interface that discourages copying of images and allows full display of metadata including camera data and captions. So photojournalists really can break down the photo to discuss technique, composition and the meaning of the images.