Silver Chips one of top five newspapers in nation

The Silver Chips print edition was named a national Pacemaker by the National Scholastic Press Association (NSPA) on Saturday, Nov 23.

The Pacemaker award, often referred to as the Pulitzer Prize of high school journalism, is given annually to approximately twenty high school newspapers. Silver Chips was one of five schools to win in the "17 or more pages" category this year, along with Walt Whitman High School's Black and White. "We're all ecstatic to receive such an honor," said Editor-in-Chief Stephen Wertheim.

Silver Chips also won second Best of Show in the "21 or more pages" category at the NSPA convention in Dallas, Texas, for its November issue.

More information about the Pacemaker award is available at the NSPA website.

The Pacemaker award, under its current co-sponsorship of NSPA and the Newspaper Association of America Foundation, has been awarded since 1971. The NSPA had been giving awards, however, since 1927. The judges, professional journalists in Dallas of the JEA/NSPA Fall National High School Journalism Convention, grade newspapers based on coverage and content, quality of writing and reporting, leadership on the opinion page, evidence of in-depth reporting, design, photography, and art and graphics.

Pacemakers are selected by the staff of a professional newspaper in the host city of the JEA/NSPA Fall National High School Journalism Convention (2001 entries were judged by the Boston Globe).

Silver Chips was one of ten national finalists for the Pacemaker award announced in September. With Black and White and Stinger of Emmaus, PA, Silver Chips was only one of three finalists from the East Coast. For a complete list of the original finalists see here.

Blair's online newspaper, Silver Chips Online, will be judged separately in February and the finalists for the Pacemakers Online Newspaper awards will be announced in March 2003 for a convention on April 10-13 in Portland, OR. The editors in chief, are confident given that Silver Chips Online, according to Yahoo.com, continues to be the most visited high school newspaper in the nation.

The 2001-2002 Silver Chips staff won over 40 awards from the 2002 Maryland Scholastic Press Association Individual Writing and Editing Contest.

Students especially honored:

Senior Stephen Wertheim won five awards: second place in Front-Page Layout and Web Feature Writing as well as first and second place for Web Review and Opinion and an honorable mention for News.

Alumni Elizabeth Green won four awards: second place in the categories of Editorial and Features as well as honorable mentions in the categories of In-Depth Story and Profile.

Senior Eric Shansby won first place in the categories of Newspaper Comic, Editorial Cartoon (and third place), Hand or Computer Generated Illustration.

Alumni Joseph Howley won first place and shared second place with Ben Meiselman for Web News Writing. He also won third place for Web Review and Opinion.

Senior Jessica Stamler won first place in Front Page Layout

Senior Colby Chapman won first place in both Features and Signed Editorial/Column as well as third place for Single Page Inside Layout.

Alumni Katie Jentleson won second place in the Signed Editorial/Column category

Senior Mathew Yalowitz won first place for Web Feature Writing and shared third place with alumni Julia Kay for News.

Senior Tina Peng won second place for Profile.

Senior Jared Sagoff won second place for News.