2024 is Flagler’s 19th year celebrating COM week, with the theme as “Follow the Money”.
Rooted in investigative journalism, this old-school catchphrase can help "unravel some of the mysteries" of today's media landscape. “Following the money” allows communication students and professionals to “better understand what's behind the overwhelming and sometimes confusing onslaught of content we all face.”
For Com Week's fifth-annual speech competition, students were asked to respond to the topic “Beyond the Paycheck: how do you define your personal or professional value?” within 3-5 minutes.
President Delaney giving Jay Hawkins 3rd-place award
Of more than a dozen students who participated, only three were awarded winning spots in Flagler College’s fifth annual COM week speech competition. The winning students included Ashley Chatmon in first place, Izzy Swyt in second place, and Jay Hawkins in third place. Cash prizes were taken home for their success with a first place prize of $150, second place prize of $100, and third place prize of $50.
More recently added to this week of programming was the One-Minute Film Festival in which were tasked with creating a 60-second film about anything that gets the audience to consider this year's theme of “following the money.”
Member of 1st-place short film team accepting award
Seven students were awarded cash prizes for capturing the “follow the money” theme in their short films, getting the audience to examine how to do just that. Those students included a filmmaking team of Izzy Swyt, Sara Orr, M.W., Rachel Schmidtchen, and Dasha Linna in first place for their film,“Digitalized”; Alana Caballero-Rivera in second place for her film “Following the Money”; and Hannah Vaffis in third place for her film “At What Cost”. Cash prizes were taken home for their success with a first place prize of $150, second place prize of $100 and third place prize of $50.
