‘The Eagle’ wins 18 awards at UPA dinner

The Eagle Newspaper made school history again, bringing home 18 awards during the Utah Press Association’s “Better Newspaper Contest” Saturday.

Utah State University Eastern’s staff bested its old record of 17 awards with four first-place plaques, nine second-place and five third-place awards. The paper’s staff was well represented with writers, photographers and journalism/communication adviser Susan Polster attending the dinner.

Editor-in-chief Kalli Prendergast cleaned up, winning four awards outright and collaborating on an additional three with Nathan Milch, who won three-individual awards himself. Other students who won were Tai Justice, Emma Campbell, Kevin van der Spek, Rilee Jones and managing editor Scott Froehlich. Tyson Chapell also won an award for “Best Feature Photo.”

Associate Vice President Greg Dart said, “As an institution, we could not be more proud of the work done by The Eagle staff and faculty adviser Susan Polster. The annual Utah Press Association awards are a testament to the quality of the product produced by our journalism and communication students. These are well deserved honors and I join the UPA in applauding the effort.” 

 Polster also gave her student’s praise, citing their work ethic and ability to outshine opponents. “The easiest way to explain what this means, is referencing the “David and Goliath” analogy. The USU Eastern Eagle Newspaper was pitted against the U of U, BYU, Weber and USU newspapers and Eastern’s students placed second overall. It seems surreal that the Eastern staff does so well, but they do every year and they never let the bigger schools intimidate them in depth, creativeness and overall quality.”