Northwestern Mass Communication Junior Earns OAB Scholarship

October 24, 2022

Mass communication student Cade Kennedy (left) visits with Oklahoma Association of Broadcasters President Vance Harrison after receiving a $1,000 scholarship from OAB.

Northwestern students attending the annual Student Day in Oklahoma City are (from left) Cade Kennedy, Colby Dalton and Allison Schieber. The event was sponsored by the Oklahoma Broadcast Education Association, along with the Oklahoma Educational Television Authority and the Oklahoma Association of Broadcasters.

A Northwestern Oklahoma State University mass communication major recently received one of four $1,000 scholarships from the Oklahoma Association of Broadcasters.

Cade Kennedy, Alva junior, accepted the award Oct. 5 at the annual Student Day Conference held in Oklahoma City at the Oklahoma Educational Television Authority studio and co-sponsored by the Oklahoma Broadcast Education Association.

OAB President Vance Harrison presented the scholarship awards.

The scholarships are intended for communication students with a strong interest in broadcast. Kennedy has been producing a sports video podcast, The Guys Who Stare at Stats, usually twice a week, sometimes more often if breaking news occurs in the world of sports.

He started the podcast on Aug. 31, 2021, and has continued producing even during the summer. He has completed more than 80 episodes.

Kennedy has various co-hosts who participate on the podcast, but he is the main host of each episode. The program is live streamed on https://www.twitch.tv/nwtv7 on Tuesdays and Thursdays at 5 p.m., though the times can vary, and then posted to YouTube for later viewing. He has about 100 regular fans following his work.

Kennedy also works at the local radio station, KRDR 105.7, and has been a correspondent for KWOX 101.1 in Woodward for high school sports coverage.

Besides his podcast and radio work, Kennedy produces two sports pages each week for the student-produced Northwestern News.  

Dr. Kaylene Armstrong, associate professor of mass communication, is his adviser at the newspaper.

“I’m really proud that Cade has been keeping his show going even though our department staffing has been in flux since summer, so he has had to do it on his own,” she said. “He really works hard at doing the best job possible, both for the newspaper and for his podcast. And through it all, he maintains excellent grades.”

Armstrong also attended the Student Day event and said she spoke with Harrison, who said the judging panel was extremely impressed with Kennedy’s work and ranked him high.

Each university is allowed to have only one student apply for the scholarship. Two other Northwestern mass communication students also attended the event: Allison Schieber, Okeene sophomore, and Colby Dalton, Amarillo, Texas, freshman. The day-long conference featured four panel discussions on media election coverage, corporate and non-profit video production, life after “news” and sports/new media.

The 2022 Student Day was the first since Covid-19 that forced the organizers to cancel the event for the last two years.

To learn more about Northwestern’s Communication Department, visit https://www.nwosu.edu/school-of-arts-and-sciences/communication.

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