2020 VPA News and Advertising Contest

Editorial Writing ( Non-Daily Group 2)Back

  • Place Name: First Place
    Contestant Name: The Commonwealth Times
    Entry Title: The Editorial Writing of Tagwa Shammet, The CT
    Entry Credit: Tagwa Shammet
    Judge Comment: Writing in The Commonwealth Times, Opinion Editor Tagwa Shammet offers powerful essays on inconsistent treatment of protesters by Richmond, Va. police. She also writes about how she grew up respecting police but now fears them due to the treatment of Blacks by law enforcement and the deaths of two African-American men (George Floyd in Minneapolis and Ahmaud Autry, allegedly shot by two white men while jogging). But her overarching themes are her desire for White America to see and respect her and people like her. ?I am Black. I am Muslim. I am an immigrant. I am a woman. I am an American. But when people see me, they don?t see that last characteristic.?
  • Place Name: Second Place
    Contestant Name: The Recorder
    Entry Title: Editorial writing
    Entry Credit: Anne Adams
    Judge Comment: The Recorder offered a series of well-written, well-reasoned commentaries with calls for action as well as praise, especially for ordinary citizens doing extraordinary things after a controversial gas pipeline was cancelled. ?They demanded details. They demanded fairness. They demanded information, justification, and truth,? The Recorder wrote. ?And they never gave up.?
  • Place Name: Third Place
    Contestant Name: The Farmville Herald
    Entry Title: Editorials
    Entry Credit: Roger Watson, Alexa Massey, Titus Mohler, Crystal Vandegrift
    Judge Comment: The Farmville Herald has come a long way as it addresses racial issues and recent protests in editorials while fully admitting it was on the wrong side of history in the 1950s and later years while advocating segregation. One editorial contrasted the 2020 appearance of law enforcement on a courthouse steps declaring outrage over the death of a Black man ? George Floyd ? in Minneapolis. On the same steps in 1963, black demonstrators were ?manhandled and dragged ? from the steps of the Farmville Baptist Church.? Another editorial calls for a statue to be erected in honor of a Civil Rights pioneer who protested inadequate education in 1951, A separate editorial criticizes local government agencies for shutting out public commentary in this COVID-19 era and calls on them to find more effective ways for public comment on important issues.