C-SPAN announced this week Alexander Weitman and Stephen Ledford, seniors at Baton Rouge Magnet High School, are third prize winners in C-SPAN’s national 2010 StudentCam Competition.  They will share $750 for their documentary, “A Businessman’s Economy: Renewing Faith in the Free Market.” 
 
C-SPAN awarded a total of 75 student prizes and 11 faculty advisor prizes totaling $50,000, including: a grand prize winner, two first prize winners, eight second prize winners, 16 third prize winners and 48 honorable mentions in both middle and high school categories. This year's StudentCam competition generated a record number of entries.  Nearly 2,000 students from 45 states and the District of Columbia submitted 1,003 entries, an 8-percent increase over StudentCam 2009.
 
C-SPAN is funded by America’s cable companies that help support StudentCam. In Baton Rouge, the C-SPAN networks and its educational outreach programs, such as StudentCam, are supported through Cox.
 
"We extend our congratulations to Alex and Stephen on their award-wining documentary,” said Jacqui Vines, senior vice president and general manager for Cox Louisiana. “We also congratulate the faculty and staff of Baton Rouge Magnet High School for continuing to provide the highest quality educational experience to its students, as this marks the second straight national award from C-SPAN earned by Baton Rouge High students.”
 
The national competition, now in its sixth year, invited all middle school students (grades 6-8) and high school students (grades 9-12) to produce a five-to-eight minute documentary focusing on one of our country’s strengths or a challenge the country is facing.  Students overwhelmingly focused on challenges facing America, with health care and the economy as the top two issues addressed.
 
The top 27 videos will air on C-SPAN, one each day, starting on Thursday, April 1, at about 6:50 a.m. ET, followed by an interview with the winning student at 8:30 am ET during C-SPAN’s “Washington Journal.”  Air times are subject to change. 

The annual competition is sponsored by C-SPAN Classroom and the documentaries were judged by a panel of C-SPAN representatives. Documentaries were evaluated based on the thoughtful examination of the competition’s theme, quality of expression, adherence to the time limit, inclusion of varying sides of the documentary’s topic, and incorporation of C-SPAN programming. C-SPAN Classroom, www.c-spanclassroom.org, is a free membership service dedicated to supporting educators’ use of C-SPAN programming and Web sites in their classes or for research. 

Winning videos may be viewed from www.studentcam.org and used in a broadcast with attribution to C-SPAN.  To schedule an interview with the students or with C-SPAN education relations staff, please contact C-SPAN’s Meredith Rapp or Tamara Robinson at (202) 626-4861 or 6129, respectively, or Baton Rough High principal Nanette McCann at (225) 383-0520.