Journalism Staff Earns Statewide Acclaim

By: Debbie Gascon, Russel Young, and Amy Medlock-Greene,

      Journalism Teachers

This past weekend Dutch Fork High School’s publications were honored with awards at the annual conference of the Southern Interscholastic Press Association (SIPA).  All DFHS publications staffs were represented at the conference:  the literary magazine, Revelations; the newspaper, The Renaissance; the broadcast program, “The Silver Screen Report” and the yearbook, The Legacy.  Current and former Dutch Fork students were honored.  Whole staffs took home some of the highest ratings SIPA offers.  Both The Legacy and Revelations earned All-Southern ratings and each was named Best in the State.  “The Silver Screen Report” earned a Superior rating and the newspaper staff won Best Overall in the newspaper Writing, Editing and Design competition. 

During the annual conference staffs attended sessions on design, photography, videography and writing.  These sessions were taught by professional journalists as well as nationally acclaimed journalism teachers including Dutch Fork High School newspaper and broadcast adviser Amy Medlock-Greene.  Individual student awards went to Dutch Fork alumni Matthew Koon-Stack (Literary Magazine: Best Non-Fiction Prose), Megan Grant (Literary Magazine: Best Poetry), and current students Morgan Holton (Broadcast: Best Sports Story), Davis Tuggle and Austin Lewis (Broadcast: Best News Story), and Charmaine McKinley (Broadcast: Best Feature Story).  Senior Diana Barahona completed her tenure as SIPA President and junior Morgan Holton was elected as next year’s Member-at-Large. 

This is the first time adviser Russell Young’s literary magazine has taken home Best in State honors; this is the second consecutive Best in State win for yearbook adviser Deborah Gascon.

Visit http://www.foxfusion.org/ to view current and archived issues of The Renaissance and episodes of “The Silver Screen Report”.  Yearbooks and literary magazines will be distributed on Tuesday, May 17^th from 6-9pm—be on the lookout for more information in the weeks ahead.  Next up, the publications staffs will be attending the first-ever Journalism Day at Carowinds in April and the South Carolina Scholastic Press Association (SCSPA) conference in May at the University of South Carolina.