Communication students of Texas A&M University-San Antonio celebrated 40 awards at the 2022 Texas Intercollegiate Press Association conference March 23-26.
Jaguar Student Media, which includes El Espejo, The Mesquite and Enlace TV News, sent 19 students and four faculty advisers to Fort Worth to participate in live contests, attend journalism workshops and celebrate at an awards ceremony.
This was the first in-person TIPA convention since 2019. The pandemic forced the organization to cancel the 2020 event, and TIPA hosted a virtual conference in 2021.
El Espejo, the student magazine, was awarded the best student magazine in Texas. “The Bullet” is the spring issue of 2021. Solomon Wilson, A&M-San Antonio 2021 graduate, explained how this project came to formation. The magazine’s title represents health disparities, racial inequities and police brutality.
“Texas A&M San Antonio is very POC forward,” Wilson said of the university’s support of people of color. “They focus on demographics that are nontraditional. So having this mixed demographic in the newsroom was so beneficial to creating such a diverse piece.”
Wilson explained the magazine wasn’t concerned with what other schools were doing, and he believes that’s what made it great.
El Espejo won six awards in Division 5 for previously published work from 2021, including three first-places for feature photo, feature story and sports column. Division 5 comprises institutions with smaller enrollment, such as Northeast Texas Community College, the University of the Incarnate Word and A&M-Galveston. The magazine also won an Honorable Mention competing against schools in all divisions for a Spanish feature story by Karla Monsivais.
Bryan Garza, an A&M-San Antonio communications junior and Enlace staffer, returned from Fort Worth with an award of his own.
Garza competed in TIPA’s live Spanish Radio Announcing contest. He won first place in this category and reminisced on the experience. The live contests pitted students against competitors from all five TIPA divisions, including larger schools such as UT-Arlington and Texas State University.
“Honestly, at first before recording the actual script that they gave to me, it was pretty nerve-racking,” Garza said. “I actually got praised by the guy recording me and he said that no student was as confident as I was, which I wasn’t. I was really nervous.”
Despite his nerves going into TIPA, Garza recommends the competition for other students. Additionally, he mentioned the benefits of getting to know a lot of people and networking with many companies.
Enlace earned five awards or honorable mentions in the live contests, which also included live video news, copy editing and editorial cartoon.
Daisy Gonzalez-Quezada, editor-in-chief of The Mesquite, won an honorable mention in the Print News Writing live contest. Armando Villarreal III, a communication senior competing for The Mesquite, won second place for live video news.
Clarissa Martinez, a communications senior and 2021 Mesquite editor-in-chief, shared what it was like to be acknowledged.
“We had a lot of great awards get recognized for TIPA,” Martinez said. ”I was able to win first place in general news. It’s really awesome to kinda just be recognized for the hard work you put in.”
Martinez said she was pleased to see The Mesquite get 23 of 40 awards that Jaguar Student Media won. They included nine first-place honors in previously published categories such as sports game story, general news multimedia story and headline writing.
“Being a graduating senior makes me feel like I’m leaving my legacy behind,” Martinez said. “It makes me proud.”
Check out the awards here, which include previously published work from 2021 as well as live on-site contests.
