Entries open for Geddes student journalism prizes 2019

21 Dec 2018

Philip Geddes in Trinity College gardens in 1981
Philip Geddes, while a student at St Edmund Hall, in 1981

St Edmund Hall, together with the Philip Geddes Memorial Fund, invites applications from student journalists at the University of Oxford for this year’s Philip Geddes, Ronnie Payne and Clive Taylor awards. The value of the main Philip Geddes Prize is £2,500; the Ronnie Payne Prize for Foreign Reporting is worth £2,000; and the Clive Taylor Prize for Sports Journalism is £2,000.

The awards are made on the condition that the money must be used for a media project or for expenses needed to support an internship in the media. Successful candidates later submit a report or project which demonstrates the use to which the prize money was put. Previous Geddes Prize winners include many talented journalists now working for The Economist, The Times, The Guardian, the Daily Express, Reuters, ITN, BBC radio and television.

Eligibility and further details

The Philip Geddes Prize is open to undergraduate members of the University in their second, third or fourth years.

  • Applicants for the Ronnie Payne Prize for Foreign Reporting should be undergraduates of the University in their second, third or fourth year who have already participated in student journalism and hope to make their career in journalism. Applicants for the Ronnie Payne Prize are required to put forward a proposal for a journalistic project which will take them abroad, that project being funded or part-funded by the prize money.
  • The Clive Taylor prize is awarded for sports journalism and is open to all current University graduates or undergraduates regardless of year of study.
  • Eligible students may enter one, two, or all three of the prizes, using the same work samples should they wish, or additional samples as relevant to each prize (for example, an entrant may submit up to six general articles to apply for the Geddes Prize and a further six for the Clive Taylor Prize, or just six articles to apply for both).
  • Samples may comprise any journalistic work completed during the student’s time at the University.
  • Joint entries for prizes are not permitted.

How to apply

Candidates for the prizes are asked to submit their entry as two Word documents:

  • a minimum of three and a maximum of six pieces of journalistic work completed whilst at the University, pasted together as ONE Word document. The articles should have original headlines, byline, name of publication, date published and a web link attached, and
  • an outline (maximum 500 words) Word document of a specific journalistic project upon which the applicant proposes to spend the award. This document should include the candidate’s name, college, area of study and year of study at the top. A rudimentary budget for the project should also be included in this document.

Applications should be emailed to geddesprize@seh.ox.ac.uk by midnight on Sunday of 4th week (3 February 2019). The subject line of your mail should be clearly marked with the name of the prize(s) for which you are applying.

Short-listed applicants will be interviewed by the judging panel on Friday of 5th week (15 February), at St Edmund Hall.

About the awards

The awards are named after Philip Geddes, an alumnus of St Edmund Hall and a journalist of considerable promise. After graduating he joined the staff of the London Evening Standard, then moved to the staff of the Daily Express. In December 1983 he was in Harrods, the Knightsbridge store, when orders were issued for the building to be evacuated. Realising there was a story to be had, he went to investigate. He was killed by the blast from a bomb planted by the IRA. Philip was just 24. The Philip Geddes Memorial Prize has been awarded since 1984, to encourage promising student journalists.

The Clive Taylor Prize for Sports Writing is in memory of the distinguished cricket writer Clive Taylor. Clive toured with every major MCC team in the 19 years before he died, aged 50, in 1977 and was the cricket correspondent of The Sun.

The Ronnie Payne Prize for Foreign Reporting was established by Ronnie’s widow, Celia Haddon, and honours his work as an acclaimed foreign correspondent and war reporter. Over the course of a long and distinguished career, Ronnie Payne became a much-respected expert on espionage and terrorism. He died, aged 87, in 2013.

All News