Student publications earn top honors at competition

Hundreds of Texas students representing 51 universities and colleges converged on San Antonio for the Texas Intercollegiate Press Association Conference March 22-24.

Among the attendees were  15 students from UMHB. The Bells and Bluebonnet earned 56 awards, including best overall excellence in each of their divisions. The yearbook also won sweepstakes for the third year in a row.

Junior Jessa Grassi was awarded one of only four scholarships given to students of four-year universities.

Vicky Kendig, adviser of the newspaper, said it was one of  UMHB’s best years at TIPA.

"I am pleased with the number and quality of awards The Bells and its individual staff members won. This recognition reflects the dedication and hard work our young journalists expend to make the newspaper successful.”

TIPA began at Baylor University in 1909. It is the oldest and largest collegiate press association in the nation.

Students participated in on-site contests, which are conducted under deadlines and are not separated by school size. Everyone competes at the same level. Universities and colleges can have one entrant in each of the 27 categories.

Contestants are given pre-developed materials or attend an event. They then have a certain amount of time to complete the task required.

On the second day of the conference, workshops were held in areas of newspaper journalism, yearbook, photography and public relations.

Several students involved in the sports writing category attended a baseball game at the University of Texas-San Antonio later that evening for the final on-site contest.

Junior Jennifer Meers, editor of the Bluebonnet, said the conference was a good chance for the staff to attain skills and “getting awards gave us motivation to go back and produce another quality yearbook.”

Meers also competed in the magazine design on-site contest  and won second place.

Avery Reese, adviser for the yearbook, was especially excited about the award.

"This is a really significant accomplishment. We don’t have a magazine that’s solely student-driven here at UMHB, but Jennifer was able to take her yearbook layout and design skills and apply them to the magazine design contest,” she said.

Prior to arriving in San Antonio, schools submitted entries for the prepublished contest. They are judged by professional   journalists and media representatives from states outside of Texas. 

UMHB won two of the four awards for in-depth reporting.  Senior Sarah-Jane Sanders and Grassi placed second for their series on Belton.

One judge said, “I want this team to come to Seattle to work for my community newspapers. It was solid reporting and well written. It shows that what some think is a negative, the reality is that both sides are positively interacting ..... Good quotes ...  this series made me read every word, not easy to do for a busy editor of two newspapers.”

Sanders, along with Christi Snow, last year’s assistant editor, and sophomore Randi Adams took third place with their series about immigration issues on the Texas-Mexico border, which was published in spring 2006.

Senior Chelsea Schilling’s story  about the war protesters in Crawford took third place in the news story category.

The judges said, “Schilling gives us solid reporting on an undoubtedly difficult story in the Texas atmosphere. Both sides are clearly represented in their own words, the best way to tell this kind of story. The quotes were well chosen and well used to show the feelings of opposites.”

Sanders, The Bells editor,  said she was proud to see that the school had received an award in nearly every category it entered.

"It is a testament to the hard work our staff has put forth on an individual and group effort,” she said. “I was not surprised that we came out with overall excellence.”

Publication students also racked up honors outside of TIPA as well.  Sanders, Snow and Adams won third place in in-depth reporting from the Society of Professional Journalists last weekend.

Meers won third place and Amy Ivy first place from the Columbia Scholastic Press Association yearbook competition, and the yearbook won a bronze award.