Congratulations to all of the outstanding award winners in the 2012 SPJ Northwest Excellence in Journalism Contest. This annual contest honors the very best in journalism in SPJ’s Region 10 which includes Alaska, Oregon, Washington, Idaho and Montana. This year’s contest covers work produced or published in 2012 within our region.

We received more than 1,900 entries from more than 260 news outlets and journalists representing Daily Newspapers (small, mid-sized and large dailies), Non-Daily Newspapers, Alternative Newsweeklies, Magazines, TV (two market sizes), Radio and Online.

Those entries were submitted to judges across the United States – Cincinnati, Florida, Michigan, Illinois, Kansas City and Missouri – to choose our finalists in almost 185 categories. Those winners were honored on Saturday, May 18 in ceremonies in Portland and Seattle. The William O. Douglas chapter will be presenting its awards on May 22.

Please join us in congratulating our winners!

–> 2012 SPJ NW Excellence in Journalism Contest Winners <–

Ian Marquand, Regional Director
Dana Neuts, National SPJ Secretary/Treasurer

P. S.   For those who want to order duplicate awards or request corrections, we’ll post that info. next week.

And the winner is…

All of the entries in the 2012 SPJ NW Excellence in Journalism Contest have been judged and the winners are in. Winners will be notified this week if they have won an award for their work. However, specific information – category and place – will not be given. That information will be announced on May 18 at awards galas in Seattle and Portland. If you are not attending one of the awards events, a complete list of winners will be posted here by 11:59 p.m. on Sat., May 18.

For more information about the events, please contact your local chapter:

Portland:

Sat., May 18, 6 p.m.
Hotel Lucia, catered by Imperial
Registration $55
Contact Christian Gaston for more info.

Seattle:

Sat., May 18, 5 – 7 p.m.
Seattle Renaissance Hotel
Contact SPJ W Washington Pro Chapter for more info.

This is a friendly reminder that we are accepting submissions to the 2012 SPJ Northwest Excellence in Journalism Contest through Fri., Feb. 22, 2013 at 4:59 p.m. If you’ve already submitted entries, thank you! If you’ve been putting it off, please be sure to submit your entries by the deadline. There will not be another deadline extension.

Region 10 Contest Info.

Submit Entries Now

Have questions? Let us know. Our support team is ready to help:  Ruth Pettis, Dana Neuts and Ian Marquand.*

*We know that journalists are well known for procrastination. We can appreciate that, but please keep in mind that we will receive hundreds of inquiries the last few days of the contest. To be sure we have time to answer your questions, please contact us sooner rather than later. Do not wait until Friday afternoon to ask your questions; we may not be able to address your concerns before the deadline. Thanks for your understanding!*

HELENA, Mont., January 7, 2013 – Today Region 10 of the Society of Professional Journalists (SPJ) announced its call for entries for the 2012 SPJ Northwest Excellence in Journalism contest. The contest honors exceptional journalism published or produced in 2012 in Washington, Oregon, Alaska, Idaho and Montana in all forms of media (print, online, radio, and TV). Both SPJ and non-SPJ members are invited to participate in the contest.

The SPJ Northwest Excellence in Journalism contest is officially accepting entries today through 4:59 pm (PST) on Fri., Feb. 15, 2013. SPJ Regional Director Ian Marquand, a freelance journalist in Helena, Mont., highlights several changes to this year’s contest:

- In Alternative Weeklies, the Criticism category was renamed Critiques and Reviews.
- In the Non-Daily Newspaper category, Portrait Photography was added.
- In Magazines, News Photography was eliminated.
- In the Online category, descriptions were added for clarification. In addition, Best Site, Commentary was eliminated.
- In Radio and Television, the General Excellence category was eliminated.
- In Television, for the purpose of clarification, Spot News Reporting is now Live Breaking News Coverage and Photojournalism is now Video Photography.

In the 2011 contest, approximately 2,000 entries in 200 categories were received from around the region. A similar number is anticipated this year. In late February, entries will be submitted to out-of-state journalists for judging, due back at the end of March. Winners’ notifications will be made in mid to late April.

The Western Washington Pro and Southwestern Washington/Oregon Pro SPJ chapters will present awards to those in their respective chapters at awards banquets in Seattle and Portland on Sat., May 18. The remaining awards will be announced online that evening and presented by their respective chapter leaders.

For more information about the contest or to begin submitting entries through Omni Solutions, please visit the contest entry portal at http://reg10spjcontest.com.

For questions, please contact contest administrator Ruth Pettis at ruthpettis10@gmail.com or 206-781-8097, or SPJ Secretary/Treasurer Dana Neuts at spjdana@gmail.com or 360-920-1737, or regional director Ian Marquand at marquand.im@gmail.com or 406-529-6494.

Revised Jan. 7, 2013 (changes are noted in red) — On Jan. 7, 2013, we’ll open the call for entries in the 2012 Northwest Excellence in Journalism Contest. Here is the timeline and key dates for you to be aware of.

Jan. 7, 2013: Entry forms and instructions posted. Entries can be submitted. All entries will be submitted electronically except General Excellence awards.

Feb. 15, 2013:  Entry deadline. All entries must be submitted by 4:59 pm.  (firm deadline)

Feb. 25, 2013:  Entries to be sent electronically to our out-of-state judges.  (All judging will be done online.) Ruth to mail General Excellence hard copy entries to judges.

Mar. 25, 2013:  Judging deadline. All entries should be judged online by this date.

Apr. 22, 2013:  Winners announced via email  (names and organizations only; no places or categories will be given)

May 6, 2013:  Verbal whisper campaign, if desired, by chapters hosting banquets.

May 18, 2013: Local chapters host awards events (contact your chapter for details)

Thank you and Happy Holidays from Region 10!

Ian Marquand & Dana Neuts

At least three entries must be submitted in each contest category for the entries to move on to judging. In the following categories, there were only one or two entries so the categories will be disqualified. Refunds will be issued in early June to contestants who submitted entries in these categories.

- Daily Newspapers < 25K circ. (A) – Headlines
- Daily Newspapers < 25K circ. (A) – Editorial Cartoon
- Daily Newspapers < 25K circ. (A) – Business Column
- Daily Newspapers 25,001-50K circ. (B) – Business Column
- Alt+Newsweeklies (D) – Criticism
- Alt+Newsweeklies (D) – Portrait Photography
- Online (G) – Best Site, Commentary
- Radio (H) – General Excellence
- Radio (H) – Photography-Online
- TV, 1-120 (I) – Spot News Reporting
- TV, 1-120 (I) – General Excellence
- TV, 121-210 (J) – General Excellence

Now that the 2011 SPJ NW Excellence in Journalism Awards have been announced, we are starting to receive requests for duplicate awards and corrections. Here’s how re-orders and corrections will work:

1)  Please download this form to request a correction or order a duplicate trophy or certificate.

2)  Submit it to regional director Dana Neuts with your payment by July 15 (note: if it is our error, we’ll pay for the correction).

3)  We’ll make changes to the trophies, certificates and online awards booklet all at once after all of the changes have been submitted.

Because the trophies and awards booklet are being done by outside vendors and there is a cost involved with each change, we are not able to make changes more quickly. Thank you for your understanding.

Congratulations to all of the winners in our 2011 SPJ Northwest Excellence in Journalism Contest! We had more than 2,100 entries this year in 184 categories. Trophies were awarded to 1st place winners and certificates were awarded to 2nd and 3rd place winners at awards ceremonies tonight in Portland, Ore. and Seattle, Wash. Other chapters will host their own events, or will provide awards to the winners on an individual basis.

–> Click here to download the complete list of winners <–

Need to order a corrected trophy or certificate, or order a duplicate? Download the order form here and submit it to regional director Dana Neuts by July 15.

We’d like to thank our out-of-state judges for helping us choose this year’s winners. We couldn’t have done it without you! A special thanks to these chapters and their teams of judges who helped:

- Paul Fletcher, Pat Kane and Virginia Pro SPJ

- Jack Zibluk

- Stirling Morita and Hawaii SPJ

- Nic Garcia, Colorado SPJ

- Jodie Mozdzer, Connecticut SPJ

- Kelly Kissel, Sonny  Albarado & Michael Koretzy, Green Eye Shades

- Bob Lipper, Long Island SPJ

- Sarah Bauer, Minnesota SPJ

- Scott Thiesen, Minnesota SPJ

- Jenn Rowell, Washington D.C. SPJ

- Ginny Frizzi, Pennsylvania SPJ

- Kevin Smith, SPJ past-president and Ethics Chair

- Carol Cole-Frowe, Oklahoma SPJ & freelance committee member

Congratulations to all of our award winners in the 2011 SPJ NW Excellence in Journalism Awards. If you have won an award, you and/or your media organization have already been notified. Awards will be presented to winners in the Greater Oregon and W. Washington Pro chapters this Saturday, May 19 at awards banquets. Other chapters in the region will present awards individually or at a special awards event. Contact your local chapter president for more info.

In addition, we will post the full winners’ list here by midnight, Sunday, May 20 PST.

For those on our media list, we will also send an embargoed press release by noon, Friday, May 18 PST. The list is embargoed and cannot be shared or published before Sunday, May 20 PST.

Once that list has been posted, please contact regional director Dana Neuts with questions about the awards. If there is a mistake on your award, or you want to order a duplicate trophy or certificate, please download this form and submit it to Dana Neuts by July 15, 2012. Re-orders will processed in one batch so the deadline is firm.

I’m sure you are all anxiously awaiting results of the 2011 SPJ Northwest Excellence in Journalism contest. We have about 85% of the entries judged, but are still waiting on a number of categories. We will begin making contest notifications this week, starting with the broadcast categories. We will make notifications throughout the week and into next week, if necessary. Daily Newspapers, all three circulation sizes, will be the last to receive the notifications because that group has the largest number of categories waiting to be judged.

Please note that we will notify media organizations and entrants that they have won a 1st, 2nd or 3rd place award. However, we will not specify which award or category. You’ll have to wait until May 19 to receive the complete list of winners.

The Western Washington and Greater Oregon Pro Chapters will host banquets on the night of Sat., May 19 where all winners will be announced. Those chapters will hand out trophies and certificates to those within their chapter. For more information about those banquets, please contact the appropriate chapter. For additional information about the awards within your chapter, please contact your chapter representative:

- Farthest North (Alaska):  Marmian Grimes
- Oregon and SW Washington:  Laurent Bonczijk or Nigel Duara
- W. Washington:  Clay Holtzman
- William O. Douglas (E. Washington, including Tri-Cities):  Paula Horton
- Inland Northwest (greater Spokane area):  Mark Peterson or Pia Hallenberg
- Snake River (Idaho):  Becky Tallent
- Montana: Ian Marquand

For other questions, please contact Ruth Pettis, contest administrator, or Dana Neuts, regional director.