The National Student Film Institute (NSFI), formerly the Los Angeles Student Film Institute (LASFI), was founded in 1978 by Brenda Norman, Dave Master, Jutti Marsh and Ralph Rogers as a festival for films made by children from kindergarten through ninth grade. Two years later it was expanded to include the work of all high school students. The first of what became an annual festival included approximately 350 students who entered 125 films. By 1993, the Student Film Festival involved over two thousand students throughout the Los Angeles area, who together entered over 300 films. The film festival was held each year at the Directors Guild Theater in Hollywood.[1][2]
As demand for workshops, advice and support for teachers grew, NSFI/L.A's Board of Directors expanded the activities of the organization to include workshops for teachers, equipment loans, and support for filmmaking programs in schools.[3]
The Grimmy Award was an annual award given to individuals who had supported the institute and student filmmaking. Generally one "Grimmy" was awarded to a luminary within the industry and one educator. The award was named after the institute's first honorary chairperson, Grim Natwick, the creator of Betty Boop.
Established in the memory of Bill Scott, a longtime advisor to the institute, the award was created to draw attention to a concern shared by Scott and the institute that writing skills were not being emphasized as much as possible. The award acknowledges "A Good Story Well Told". Four Bill Scott Awards were awarded each year from 1986 onward. The judging criteria were graduated. The four awards were awarded to the following age groups:
Kindergarten - 2nd Grade: for a simple story: "Make an idea happen"
3rd - 6th Grade: "For a well-told story with a beginning, middle and end"
7th - 10th Grade: "For a well-told story that affects the audience emotionally"
11th - 12th Grade: "For a well-told story that affects the audience and tells the story in an original and personal way"
By the mid-1990s, with the retirement of founder Brenda Norman and the job change of founder Dave Master, it became impractical for the institute and festival to continue and so were dissolved.
^National Student Film Institute/L.A: The Sixteenth Annual Los Angeles Student Film Festival. The Directors Guild Theatre. June 10, 1994. p. 7.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
^Editor (March 4, 1984). "Student Films Critiqued" Los Angeles Times Part VI, p.5.
^National Student Film Institute/L.A: The Sixteenth Annual Los Angeles Student Film Festival. The Directors Guild Theatre. June 10, 1994. pp. 10–11.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
^Los Angeles Student Film Institute: 13th Annual Student Film Festival. The Directors Guild Theatre. June 7, 1991. p. 3.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
