Bartlett High journalists win award

Along with steno pads and pencils, Bartlett High School students brought some well-honed skills with them to the 2008 Sectional IHSA Journalism Competition in mid-April.

Of the nine teams of student journalists in attendance, Bartlett took third place overall.

Jill Flanagan, Bartlett High School English teacher and newspaper adviser, said the team's goal was to make it into the top six teams in the sectional competition.

Flanagan said her school's third place finish was a great accomplishment, considering that just two years ago it finished last.

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"They worked so hard to make this much progress," Flanagan told the Daily Herald May 1.

The Bartlett students, Flanagan said, used the feedback from the judges the previous two years to make themselves better journalists.

"We tried to use that to turn them into reporters who were more conscious of what they are doing and what they are writing," she said.

Seven sectional contests took place throughout the state. Bartlett competed in the DeKalb sectional, held on Northern Illinois University's campus April 19.

The contest consisted of 15 categories, including review writing, news writing, sports writing, yearbook theme development, copy editing and editorial cartooning. Scores are based on story organization, use of proper Associated Press style guidelines, grammar and punctuation, and if the story answers the key "who, what, when, where and why" questions.

"The lede was kind of hard to do at first, but once you start going, and once you start getting in the rhythm, you start thinking, 'Hey, this is actually pretty good,'" senior Tim Hehn said.

The top three students in each event qualified for the IHSA state finals on April 26 at Eastern Illinois University.

Seven Bartlett students advanced to the state competition with the following awards:

· Senior Tim Hehn -- first place in review writing

· Junior Emily Hayes and senior Brittany Palmer -- first place in yearbook theme development

· Sophomore Allison Prang -- second place in editorial cartooning, third place in copy editing

· Freshman Lauren Caruba -- third place in news writing

· Senior Zachary Levy -- third place in copy writing

· Senior Catherine Glubisz -- fourth place in info graphics

In the state competition at Eastern, Bartlett earned 10th place overall out of 67 teams. Individually, senior Zachary Levy took second place in copy writing. Junior Emily Hayes and senior Brittany Palmer took second in yearbook theme development.

Other area schools in the top 10 were Fremd, Naperville Central, Glenbrook South, Naperville North and Huntley.

"I could not be happier #8230; students went in; they did their best," Flanagan said.

For a complete list of winners and finalists, visit www.ihsa.org/activity/jrn/index.htm.