The Write Stuff

Ojai Valley School’s student journalists won top prizes today at the 2013 Tri-County Journalism Education Association Competition, just a week after students in the Upper Campus program won top awards in the Ventura County Star’s annual journalism competition.

Junior Emmy Addison and sophomore Daphne Psaledakis were each awarded first place in the Star awards last week. Emmy won in the News category for her story on OVS alums in Boston who were affected by the Boston Marathon bombings. Daphne won in the Sports category for her story on two girls who stepped up to the plate this spring to play on the boys’ baseball team.

Emmy also won third place for a sports story on two OVS sophomores who have competed on a rowing team this year at Lake Casitas. And the online version of the student newspaper, On the Hill, was awarded third place in the General Excellence category.

The awards are a significant recognition for OVS students, whose work was among more than 350 entries from 17 high schools countywide.

On Friday, the 10-member journalism class headed to the Tri-County Journalism Education Association competition at Cal Lutheran University, and walked away with top prizes in multiple categories.

Junior John Olivo won first place for sports writing; Junior Charlie Coe won first place for news photography and second place for feature photography; Senior Jack Beverly earned second place for editorial writing; and Daphne and Emmy each earned awards for feature writing.

The newspaper staff also won second place for its online edition of the student newspaper, On The Hill, and took second place overall in the sweepstakes category for its work on the day.

The daylong event involved “live” writing, photography, and design contests with more than 130 high school students from Ventura, Santa Barbara, and San Luis Obispo counties.

“I am immensely proud of our program and the work our small group of writers has been able to achieve,” said teacher Fred Alvarez, a former Los Angeles Times reporter who has developed the journalism curriculum at Upper Campus. “For such a small program to be able to match up against much larger schools is a huge accomplishment.”

OVS offers two progressive journalism courses at Upper Campus: first-year Journalism and second-year Advanced Media Studies. Both are University of California-approved English electives. Students in the program produce a monthly printed newspaper, bi-weekly blogs, as well as an online newspaper.

 

By Tracy Wilson-Alvarez