Student Receives Competitive Scholarship

Junior Alex Pyles, the new editor-in-chief of The Retriever Weekly, is extending UMBC’s recent run of NCAA prominence. As Pyles continues to land prestigious internship opportunities in sports journalism, the NCAA recently offered him a 2008-2009 Freedom Forum/NCAA Sports Journalism Scholarship Award.

This selective scholarship is a $3,000 award to a student who has an interest in sports journalism as a profession. 

During the summer, Pyles will intern with the sports department of the Wilmington (Del.) News-Journal as one of eight students who received the Maryland, Delaware D.C. Press Association’s Reese Cleghorn Internship. He was selected from a group of 37 finalists.

“UMBC should be especially proud of Alex Pyles because the competition for these internships and awards is ferocious. Alex is up against the largest journalism schools in the country. This is not an easy thing to do,” said Christopher Corbett, professor of the practice in the Department of English. A veteran award winning journalist, Corbett serves as faculty advisor to the Retriever.

Although some sports reporting opportunities have surfaced in the blogosphere, jobs in sports journalism remain scarce and the competition for them is intense.

“It certainly is a confidence-booster, and makes me feel like I can make a name for myself in this business,” said Pyles.

Pyles’ journalism experience includes three internships with the Baltimore Sun, freelance work for the college sports Web site www.cstv.com and his earlier role as the Retriever sports editor.

The unprecedented exposure borne out of the UMBC men’s basketball team’s first appearance in the NCAA Division I Tournament brought things full-cycle for Pyles. Just days removed from receiving his NCAA scholarship, Pyles was a live guest on a prominent national sports-radio talk show, carried on Fox Sports Radio via its network of 290 affiliates in the U.S. and Canada. He was the last of a group of national journalists asked to educate listeners about the academic hallmarks and locations of the respective universities they were covering at the Big Dance.

(4/28/08)

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