Media students receive honorable mention in New England contest

As a freshman, Ben Smith found himself cut from the basketball team. A lover of sports, he was distraught, but his mother encouraged him to pursue his second passion: media.

Knowing he wanted to pursue broadcasting for a career, Smith joined the school’s media club and quickly began to learn the craft under the mentorship of Robert Perrotti, the high school’s lead business, innovation and technology teacher.

In 2022, when Smith broke his leg, he was sidelined for the football season. But coincidentally, the high school media and Dartmouth Community Media teams had decided they wanted to do commentary on all of the school’s athletic games.

Starting with commentating volleyball games, Smith saw the team reach the final four. That same year, he did the play by play on the half court shot of Austin Santos, a student in the ATLAS program, which blew up and got recognition on sports center.

But this was only the beginning for Smith. Now on his way to graduating, he has received two honorable mentions from the New England Emmys alongside his peer sophomore Noah C. Clark. 

Smith had submitted his Thanksgiving game preview story and a play-by-play of a Dartmouth vs. Old Rochester football game. He still recalls “freaking out” with nervous and excitement before the latter game. Preparing to speak to the large crowd, “my heart just dropped to my stomach.”

However, in the end he was proud of his work: “Dartmouth fell up short in that game. It was a pretty tough game, but that was a game I really enjoyed.”

With plans to study sports broadcasting at Dean College, Smith said he hopes to bring a “real Emmy” to the school through his work.

Like Smith, Clark started out his time on the media club as a freshman, but his interest lied in directing. Looking at the success of his directing idols, he thought that this path was going to be easy.

But even in his second 12-minute production, there were a lot of people to coordinate: “When you’re a 16-year-old kid trying to tell people what to do, it’s just a really stressful job.”

Through his short film, which was a supernatural slasher that included an “iconic scream” from Ben, Clark said he hopes to answer a lot of “what ifs,” and noted there may even be a follow story.

“It’s a process,” he said. “Just trying to tell the best story with the amount of time, budget and work you have.”

In addition to the media club, Clark just wrapped up his involvement in the high school theater program’s production of “High School Musical” and his show choir season with Dynamics. 

His advice? “Go out and try your best. Go out big because you never know you might regret doing something.”

Perrotti said he is incredibly proud of his student’s accomplishments this year. Many of the projects have been funded through Donors Choose, which has helped the media program raise almost six figures for a variety of essential equipment.

To help support the media program’s projects, visit https://www.donorschoose.org/classroom/dhstvmedia?utm_source=dc&utm_medium=directlink&utm_campaign=teacher_profile&utm_term=teacher_4966930&rf=directlink-dc-2025-05-teacher_profile-teacher_4966930&challengeid=21039440

To watch DHS Media programs, visit https://www.youtube.com/dhstvmedia