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1 The Lake Travis View won five awards for excellence in journalism during the Texas Press Association’s Better Newspapers Contest (TPA).
The awards were presented during the TPA’s summer conference in Austin last Saturday.
The View won second place in Sports Coverage, third place in the Blue Moon Special Sections [for the Special Section saluting the 2008 Lake Travis 4A State Football Championship], and third place in Page Design.
Editor Charles McClure won fourth place in Column Writing and reporter Eleni Himaras won fourth place in the News Writing category.
“It’s always very nice to be recognized among our peers, and we’re very proud of what we accomplished in 2008,” said Lake Travis View Publisher Jay Plotkin. “We accomplished a lot in 2008, from covering large stories to undergoing a major redesign.”
While it is nice to win awards, Plotkin noted that service to the community is the primary focus of the newspaper.
“The most important thing for us is to produce the best newspaper we possibly can for our community, and to earn these honors while trying to do that is a nice reward for our entire staff,” Plotkin said.
The awards come on the heels of six others from the Texas Gulf Coast Press Association (TGCPA) Better Newspapers Contest last month. The TGCPA awarded the View won first place in its division for overall sports coverage, sports photography and column writing (written by McClure). The newspaper took home second place for news writing for its coverage of the shooting last December at the Steiner Ranch Steakhouse by Himaras. TGCPA awarded the newspaper third place in general excellence (based on the newspaper’s efforts in all journalistic disciplines, including advertising), as well as an honorable mention in feature photography. The View entered two photographs, one of Zack Hennig performing “With A Little Help From My Friends” during the 2008 Lake Travis High School commencement ceremony taken by Thompson, and another by McClure of musician Rusty Wier that accompanied an article about his battle against cancer.
Also in May, McClure was named to the 2009 Media Honor Roll, a program sponsored by the Texas Association of School Boards (TASB).
As a longtime reader of your paper, I congradulate you all on your recent accomplishments, I have always dreamed myself of being a writer, unfortunately that hasnt worked out just yet, although I still hold on to that dream, very tightly, almost choking the life out of it. My father was a very important man in the government. I cant talk about what his job was b/c it was important to National Security, and frankly, still is to this day. Dreams have a way of coming full circle, one day they are within youre reach and the next Big Brother takes every thing from you, youre house youre family, even youre only means of transportation, my fathers old conversion van. I am currently working on a degree in journalizm, actually I have just looked into it, but I still can dream can’t I? Again congradulatons on your accomplishments and may Jesus help all of you write. After all Jesus is just all right with me!