'Post' editor praises staff for its Ohio News Association awards.
Working for a college newspaper, sadly, is pretty different than playing for a little league soccer team — very few of us get awards or accolades, nobody brings us snacks and our staff is unlikely to throw a tantrum if it goes unrecognized.
Still, The Post is a team nonetheless. We have coaches: We just call them editors. And Wednesday, we took home a few awards. That honor still can't stop me from making the dreaded "journalism-is-like-sports" analogy. I apologize for that.
Posties placed in seven out of 10 collegiate award categories at the Ohio News Association's conference Wednesday. They won first-place in three — photojournalism, best website and news coverage — competing against college newspapers of a similar size.
With the exception of our website, which won first-place, the winning entries were submissions from last year: photos, coverage and front-page design of the Union Street fire, photos from Green Beer Day, a profile of two Ohio hockey players, coverage and front-page design of former Athens County Sheriff Pat Kelly's criminal corruption trial, a Post Modern on the Master of Fine Arts playwriting students that turn around a 3- to 5-minute play and another Post Modern on Creative Commons licenses, among others.
We're proud to have that work recognized. It's a high-five for the grind our staff provides five days a week with its newspaper.
The awards also served as a reminder for just how far that "grind" can go. Winning front-page design by former design editor Jake Newton, who placed second in the Ohio News Association's collegiate category, didn't come easy. It was enough to keep Newton in the newsroom mere hours before the paper went to press — often hours after midnight — working on making the front pages perfect for moments as memorable as when Kelly was declared "guilty" or when Union Street businesses went up in flames. Both editions of The Post are ones I've held on to and likely will keep forever.
Post Moderns take weeks to write and involve interviewing several sources. It's the most in-depth reporting we do at The Post. Elizabeth Backo was a freshman when she co-wrote the award-winning Creative Commons Post Modern with then-junior Meryl Gottlieb, whose entry of the playwriting Post Modern helped us place in the Arts and Entertainment category. That's top-notch reporting coming from winners young enough that one can't legally drink to celebrate her accomplishments.
Our sports staff won a second-place slot in its category with the profiles it wrote on Ohio's athletes. That was on top of the day-to-day game recaps and previews they were writing, often keeping them in the newsroom late at night. Our photographers won first-place with photos that told the story better than a reporter could have hoped to.
So that's what our team does. I wasn't editor-in-chief while those entries were created, that would've been the now-graduated Jim Ryan, but I'm grateful to know I'm among award-winners who grind away knowing that it isn't little league soccer, and that we all can't get trophies and ribbons.
But now that we've won a few accolades, can we please get some snacks?
Emma Ockerman is a junior studying journalism and editor-in-chief of The Post. Want to talk to her? Email her at eo300813@ohio.edu or tweet her @eockerman.
