NJ Students Honored by C-SPAN for Documentaries on Social Issues

By Anthony Orlando
NJ Urban News

Students learn a lot in school, but sometimes they teach everyone else.

C-SPAN held its 21st annual StudentCam competition, which had middle and high school students nationwide compose documentaries featuring in-depth research and expert interviews.

C-SPAN announced the winning films on March 12. 

For the 2025 competition, C-SPAN asked students to create a documentary with the theme, “Your Message to the President: What issue is most important to you or your community?”

According to C-SPAN Classroom, StudentCam received 1,756 videos from 286 schools across 42 states and Washington D.C. Out of all the submissions, 150 videos won prizes in 2025. 

Among the winners were seven students at Hackensack’s Bergen County Academies. 
The students made their documentaries for the annual project in their class run by award-winning educator Scott Lang. The winners each received “honorable mention” prizes of $250 for their documentaries

Luna Cannone and Nora Cullen for The Right to Bear Arms: This film analyzes America’s gun violence epidemic, its connection to easy firearm access, and how Americans feel so unsafe in their community that they feel the need to own firearms.

Hyunseo Ryu and HaEun Jung for Gun Violence: America’s Darkest Achievement: This short documentary also focuses on how the U.S. has become one of the leading countries in gun violence and gun-related death thanks to easy access to firearms. Additionally, it explores the widespread misconceptions surrounding gun violence and its link to mental health.

Jiayu “Jenny” Xu and Jiye Lee for Housing: An Impossible Dream: This documentary tackles the affordable housing crisis affecting millions of Americans due to higher rents, “stagnant” wages, rising inflation, and housing shortages, increasing homelessness nationwide.

Josephine Lee for America’s Transit Crisis: How We Lost Our Way (And How to Get Back On Track: Lee’s film explores how America’s public transit system has become more unreliable and unprofitable due to long waiting times, inaccessibility, the rise of streetcars, and a lack of federal funds. It also discussed public transit’s environmental, health, and economic benefits, particularly for marginalized communities.

Similarly, StudentCam’s High School East Division First Prize went to Daniel Aasa at Winslow Township High School in Atco, NJ, for Saving Sudan: U.S. Aiding in a Forgotten Crisis. This film focuses on the Lost Boys and Girls of Sudan, who escaped the country’s civil war, and calls for action on the ongoing humanitarian crisis in Sudan overlooked by the rest of the world.

The students’ choice of topics also gave insight into what they see as the issues of their generation.  

Along with gun violence, C-SPAN Classroom reported that the most popular topics addressed by the students’ films include climate change, education policies, health care, mental health, government spending, and the economy.

“I think participating in these types of competitions or projects really [allows] you to dive deeper into topics you don’t really think about, and you get to educate yourself more,” said Jiye Lee.

For many of these students, C-SPAN’s contest was their first voyage into filmmaking and the issues their films addressed. 

Some have grown up watching the news and hearing speakers discuss problems affecting their communities, instilling a strong desire to tackle them in their films.

“I think I’ve always seen these nonprofit organizations like Sandy Hook Promise and March For Our Lives that always advocate for this stuff,” said Cannone. “In my middle school, we used to have public speakers that would talk about stuff like school shootings, and it really motivated me. It made me feel like I needed to express these issues….”

Following the contest, these students feel a greater connection to their communities after raising awareness of the issues their friends and neighbors have witnessed. Many of the students have even been inspired to pursue filmmaking or animation and tackle other social issues in documentaries for their class next year.

“I’ve always loved film,” said Josephine Lee. “When I was supposed to be asleep at 8 PM, my parents would watch things like The West Wing and The Newsroom…. Those kind of introduced me to this whole realm of TV shows and also how they can introduce these more fundamental concepts of policy and change… I don’t know if I want to pursue film directly in the future, but it’s definitely something I want to remain engaged…”