Carl Kiilsgaard won the Alexia student competition with a proposal to document poverty in Eastern Kentucky.

Kiilsgaard is a senior history major at Western Kentucky University and is from Corvallis, Oregon. He has interned at Bucks County (Pa.) Times, the Napa (Calif.) Register, and the Palm Beach Post. Carl was one of Getty Images Reportage’s Emerging Talent picks in 2008. Kiilsgaard is awarded a full tuition scholarship to study photojournalism at Syracuse University in London in the Fall of 2009, plus a $1000 cash grant to help produce his project.

Second place student winner Yanina Manolova is a graduate student at Ohio University. She is a native of Bulgaria but has lived in Washington, D.C., for 10 years. She graduated with a degree in fine arts in education from Sofia University in Bulgaria. She attended Eddie Adams Workshop in 2008. Manolova is awarded a half tuition scholarship to study photojournalism at Syracuse University in London in the Fall of 2009, plus a $500 cash grant to help produce his project.

Award of Excellence winners are Philip Scott Andrews, a senior at Western Kentucky University; Khaled Hasan, a student at Pathshala South Asian Institute of Photography in Bangladesh, graduating in 2009; and Bryan Anselm, a senior at Western Kentucky University. Each Award of Excellence winner receives a $1600 scholarship that pays part of tuition, fees and living expenses to study photojournalism in London in the fall semester at Syracuse University in London and a $500 cash grant to help produce their proposed stories.

Andrews, from Annandale, Va., interned at the Fredericksburg, Va., Free Lance-Star in 2008 and Roll Call Newspaper in 2006. He attended Eddie Adams Workshop in 2008. Hasan has a masters degree in accounting from Dhaka College which is affiliated with National University in Bangladesh. He was selected to attend the 2008 National Geographic All Roads photography program. Anselm was a photographer in Uganda in Summer, 2008, for 4OneWorld.org, an organization that builds schools in Africa.

Each Award of Excellence winner receives a $1600 scholarship that pays part of tuition, fees and living expenses to study photojournalism in London in the fall semester at the Syracuse University London Centre and a $500 cash grant to help produce their proposed stories.

55 students from more than 30 universities applied to the competition this year. The judging was done at Syracuse University on Feb. 21, 2009. The judges were Sherman Williams, AME/Visuals at the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel; Bob Houlihan, director of photography at the Detroit News; and Aphrodite Tsairis, who with her husband Peter, created the Alexia Foundation 20 years ago. (See remarks Aphrodite Tsairis made at the end of the judging.)

Carl Kiilsgaard’s portfolio
Yanina Manolova’s portfolio
Philip Scott Andrews’s portfolio
Khaled Hasan’s portfolio
Bryan Anselm’s portfolio