Collegian staff report

The Collegian won College Media Association’s award for Best Two-Year Weekly Newspaper in the country Oct. 29 in Atlanta.

The honor was one of six national awards the paper received at two different national conferences for college media in October.

“I was bouncing in my seat while we waited,” managing editor Katelyn Needham said about the award ceremony. “I’m not sure if this was because of the coffee or my nerves, but I was anxious to hear how we did.”

The Collegian placed second in breaking news for its coverage of Chancellor Erma Johnson Hadley’s death a year ago and third for best two-year college website.

The Collegian also went to the Associated College Press conference Oct. 22 in Washington, where former Collegian designer Amanda Boyd won fifth place for editorial cartoon and eighth place for infographic.

Photo editor Bogdan Sierra Miranda and editor-in-chief Jamil Oakford won ninth place for a multimedia story about former president Bill Clinton’s rally on TR Campus this spring.

“I had to keep going up there,” Miranda said about the awards ceremony. “At one point, I was considering not sitting down.”

Both Miranda and Needham said conferences are great opportunities for student journalists and photojournalists to come together and network.

“At every college, the newspaper staff members are different from the student body. They’re like strangers in a strange land,” Collegian adviser Chris Whitley said. “They go up to other strangers and ask them personal questions. They harass faculty and administrators. They’re here working late hours after everyone’s gone home.”

Attending these conferences is like finding “kindred spirits,” he said.

Miranda said a photography contest based on a theme revealed at the beginning of the conference was a great learning experience.

“Shooting around D.C. was an experience on its own,” he said.

He explained how exciting it was to walk around the nation’s capital and find interesting shots.

Needham, who participated in CMA’s contest to cover Walker Stalker Con, The Walking Dead convention, said it was a fun and valuable opportunity.

“They [Paste magazine] gave me a lot of freedom,” she said. “I got to build a lot of friendships with other people from other schools.”

Needham also said that CMA gave her the chance to compare and contrast what The Collegian does to other colleges and universities.

“You work on something so closely, and you know it’s good, but to see it compared to what others are doing makes it all worth it,” she said.