The Lamp student newspaper at LLCC won 19 awards, including seven first-place awards, for journalism excellence at the Illinois Community College Journalism Association’s spring conference held virtually April 8.
The Lamp staff, led by Editor Richard Bailey of Springfield, won best website for TheLampOnline.com and best front-page design. The staff also won second place for best media.
Bailey received the annual scholarship awarded by the association to students transferring to a four-year college. It is the third year the association has offered the scholarship, and an LLCC student has been an awardee all three years.
Individual first-place awards included: Lily Goossens of Springfield for feature writing, Addison Keeley of Springfield for headline, Lille Brown of Jacksonville for news column, Skye Kretzinger of Chestnut for podcasting and Regina Ivy of Springfield, spring 2020 editor of The Lamp, for staff editorial.
“Working remotely has been a challenge, but the staff remained committed. They continued to do excellent work, and it’s reflected in a record number of first-place awards,” said Tim McKenzie, adviser of The Lamp, professor of journalism and humanities, and president of the ICCJA. “The staff awards for best media and website are about overall quality. Those awards show what I’ve seen — a staff that all works together to do the best work that they can.”
Other awards included:
- Bailey – second place, arts review; third place, news story and news column
- Bailey, Goossens and Emily Pasley of Chatham – second place, news story of the year
- Goossens – second place, news story
- Ivy – second place, news photo and editorial writer of the year; third place, feature photo; honorable mention, news photo
- Ryan Scott of Chatham – second place, sports game story
- Keeley – honorable mention, sports column