Hoosier Star staffs keep reader in mind;
Cub Reporter, Riley Review 'tuned in'
By Cheryl Pontius
For the IHSPA

Division 3

Hoosier Stars:
The Review from James Whitcomb Riley High School in South Bend
Editors: Tara Stokes and Elyse Chudzynski
Adviser: Marcia Kovas-Kokot
Cub Reporter from Lawrence Central High School in Indianapolis
Editor: Kristin Westerfield
Adviser: Elizabeth Granger

Judge's Comments:
An overall excellent quality newspaper that certainly devotes itself to its audience ­ the student readers ­ makes The Review this year's Hoosier Star winner. Within its pages, there is something for everyone from news to feature to entertainment to sports. I'm sure readers looked forward to receiving each issue.

News articles, features, opinion pieces and sports stories were all extremely well written, well researched and well organized. Leads were strong. In-depth pieces were especially well researched showing good planning. Suggestions: Try to find a local angle for every news story. You might think about adding sports briefs and/or stats. Also delete the word "that" whenever possible. If you can remove it from a sentence without changing the sentence's content, the word "that" is unneeded. It's probably one of the most overused words in the language.

Editorials make valid points and offer good, workable solutions. They're short, to the point, and effective. While columns still had too strong a sense of "I," The Review's columnists had less of this than most high school newspapers. Great group of letters to the editor.

In overall design, the front and inside pages are extremely clean ­ they're allowed to breathe without giving the illusion of too much white space. Internal and external margins are consistent. The pages offer a good combination of text, art, info graphs, photos, and illustrations. The eye has multiple entry points but isn't overwhelmed by too much.

Areas needing more work:
All music and movie reviews. Try branching out to include books, plays, art, hangouts, video games, etc. While the photo content is good, some photos are exceptionally crisp; others are dark and blurry.

Overall, a truly enjoyable newspaper to read. It leaves the reader wanting more.
Hoosier Star Winner: Lawrence Central High School ­ Cub Reporter

Judge's Comments:
The Cub Reporter is very attuned to the school and its audience. National stories (i.e., the stories about the Sept. 11 tragedy, the National Guard and the military) always provide a local angle to keep the coverage centered on and interesting to LC and its students.

The newspaper's strongest points are its news writing, feature writing, sports coverage, and photography. Writing is well researched and balanced. News Briefs pack in a lot of extra information in a small amount of space. Review writing spans a wide range from restaurants to movies to books to music. Sports coverage not only includes varsity and junior varsity teams, but major and minor sports as well. The back page scoreboard is an excellent way to showcase all LC athletics. An excellent feature is the Especially for Adults briefs -­parents read the paper, too, and you include them well.

Pages are clean and well designed. Staff editorials and cartoons make valid points and are effective.

Areas needing more work:
Work on more creative headlines.
Strengthen leads (while many are strong, others are static).
Work on columns to remove some of the "I."
Center spreads are on very pertinent topics, yet seem to depend more on the emotional appeal to pull in reader, rather than a combination of facts, emotions and helpful hints.

You have a very strong, readable publication.Hoosier Star Merit Winner: Munster High School ­ Crier
Editor: Keith Dell' Aquila
Adviser: Nancy Hastings

Judge's Comments:
The Crier displayed extremely good front-page content ­ issues that were pertinent to students such as plagiarism via the Internet and drug testing. Good creative leads and headlines, plus researched writing, made this newspaper a solid winner.

News briefs, sports coverage and stats, center spreads on relevant issues and editing combined to make this an enjoyable, student-centered newspaper. Good packaging of editorial/cartoon to news story and great review writing also played a role in establishing this newspaper as a winner.

In fact, the newspaper's strongest points are in coverage, editorial writing, cutlines, editing and creative headlines.

Some weak areas included:
Lack of graphics/illustrations
Photography reproduction
Some weakness on inside pages below the fold

Overall, the Crier is a strong newspaper with a talented staff.
Hoosier Star Merit Winner: Carmel High School ­ The HiLite
Editor: Val Simianu
Advisers: Tony Willis and Jim Streisel

Judge's Comments:
The HiLite is a very strong newspaper in the areas of briefs, leads, news and sports writing, use of typographical elements, coverage, in-depth packages, reviews and editing. Features are informative. Good packaging of editorial to a news story. Clean pages with consistent internal/external margins.

Areas needing more work:
Lack of creativity in headlines
Graphics that overshadow content
Design that can take away from content

Overall, excellent newspaper that does its job of providing information to its readers.Hoosier Star Merit Winner: Avon High School ­ Echo
Editor: Nancy Reese
Adviser: Pam Essex

Judge's Comments:
The Echo contains a wide variety of information, content, ideas and coverage for the school. Headlines are extremely creative and lead reader into the story. Leads are strong and inviting. Stories are well researched with good sources. Editorials are strong and packaged with other articles. Good mix of letters to the editor. Editorials are on relevant topics and offer workable solutions.

Areas needing more work:
Placement of graphics and dark screens often make text hard to read
Photo reproduction
Inside pages look cluttered ­ too many different design elements


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