Five student journalists win top regional SPJ awards, vie for national honors

Fort Worth, TX

3/9/2010

Five student journalists from the TCU Daily Skiff and Image magazine have won regional first-place Mark of Excellence Awards from the Society of Professional Journalists and will contend for the national MOE awards this fall.

The first place winners in the four-year college/university division include
•    Daily Skiff editor in chief Julieta Chiquillo, Feature Writing.
•    Daily Skiff multimedia editor Chance Welch, Sports Photography.
•    former Skiff editor in chief David Hall, Online In-Depth Reporting
•    former Image magazine design editor Ronald Villegas, Photo Illustration.
•    Chris Blake, breaking news reporting.

SPJ Region 8 comprises colleges and universities from Texas and Oklahoma, and the national winners and finalists in each category will be selected from among the 12 regional winners at the SPJ Convention and National Journalism Conference in Las Vegas on Oct. 3-5.

Overall, 14 TCU student journalists from the Daily Skiff, the TCU News Now broadcast and Image magazine received Mark of Excellence awards Saturday at the 2010 SPJ Region 8 Spring Conference in Austin. They include:

•    Saerom Yoo – 2nd place, Non-Fiction Magazine Article
•    Christina Durano – 2nd place, Television In-Depth Reporting
•    Chris Blake – 2nd place, Sports Writing
•    Chance Welch – 2nd place – General News Photography
•    Travis Brown, Chance Welch, Rose Baca – 3rd place, Online Sports Reporting
•    Chance Welch – 2nd place, Feature Photography
•    Katie Ruppel    - 3rd place, In-Depth Reporting
•    Patty Espinosa – 3rd place, Television In-Depth Reporting
•    Jacob Brahce – 3rd place, Editorial Cartooning

In the publications category, Image magazine won 2nd-place in the Best Student Magazine four-year College/University.