Georgia Southern University can add the MTV College Television Award to its list of student-earned thanks to the ‘Just Wild’ student-produced program.

GSU student Allen Lincoln and GSU graduates, Chris Ocampo, Tim Hunt, and AnnNell Byne were awarded as Blue Ribbon finalists after being judged by a panel of celebrity judges, according to student producer Andrew Lincoln.

“[Just Wild] was a way to promote the wildlife center and basically bring more education to the wildlife center,” Lincoln said. “It was very interesting just kind of being a part of [the program] and being able to be around animal, exotic animals. It’s kind of like you’re at National Geographic without being at National Geographic.”

This particular award focuses on student-produced video, digital and film work with entries from all over the country, according to the Emmys Foundation website.

The program went through a celebrity panel who are members of the Television Academy that rated their work as blue ribbon finalists, Lincoln said. The students are proud of the product they submitted to the panel and feel confident about the future of their work.

They had gone into working on this program as one they believed would go far in winning awards, Lincoln and Ocampo said.

“We kind of went into it thinking this is something that we want to submit for an award so when we found out that ‘hey we could submit this for an MTV award too and not just an Emmy because we were thinking that we were just going to submit for an Emmy,” Lincoln said.

Each person worked together on different parts of the program. There was not one person who was specifically assigned to a job, Lincoln said. They all worked together to create the work.

“Basically when we, all of us, work on stuff we all do pretty much everything. Everybody kind of does a little bit of something,” Lincoln said. “So I did camera work, editing, post-editing, and even holding the audio.”

The students were unsure exactly how to feel when they found out about being MTV Blue Ribbon finalists.

International Studies and modern language studies graduate, Chris Ocampo, was happy to hear about it, but was not surprised.

“I know we had won an Emmy for the past few years one for the Georgia Southern football show and another for the symphony,” Ocampo said. “I knew we submitted this same program for an Emmy this year, hoping for that would get an award, but honestly I wasn’t shock, but I was pretty happy that we’re getting recognition from other places too.”

The program has been sent in for other awards such as an Emmy and a Telly award, Lincoln said.

“Even if we don’t get the College [award], we still have chance for the Emmy,” Lincoln said. “And that’s what I like. We have a chance with other awards and other programs we can submit too.”