The Alabama Baptist recently was named among the top newspapers in the country for the ninth year in a row.
The Associated Church Press (ACP) named the paper second in Best in Class: Regional Newspaper for its work in 2005 at the ACP national convention in Orlando, Fla., April 25.
Religion Communicators Council (RCC) also honored the paper as one of the nation’s top regional newspapers at an award ceremony held earlier this year.
This year’s ACP judges wrote: “Excellent overall page makeup makes the paper feel newsy and inviting, particularly the front page. Crammed with news, photos, and features, The Alabama Baptist shows a strong, professional writing style.”
The paper also garnered an Award of Excellence from ACP for its 2005 state convention coverage. Judges wrote: “This coverage is just plain excellent journalism.”
The state Baptist paper also tied for Honorable Mention for in-depth coverage of hurricane disaster relief.
Editor Bob Terry won a first place award at the Baptist Communicators Association (BCA) national convention April 22 for his editorial “What Makes One a Baptist.”
Managing Editor Jennifer Davis Rash also garnered a second place award from BCA in feature writing for “Alabama’s Welch readies for SBC meeting in June.”
Erin W. Tunnell, assistant editor, placed second in BCA’s news writing division with “Redefined Catastrophic,” while Grace Thornton, assistant editor, was named a finalist for “The Grace Semester.” Both articles were Hurricane Katrina-related.
Tunnell garnered two awards from RCC, an award of excellence for her photo “Winter Blues” and an award of merit for “Redefined Catastrophic.”
Other Alabama Baptists also garnered awards at the recent meetings.
Larry Holloway, a photography correspondent for The Alabama Baptist, won an honorable mention from ACP for his photo “Mother’s Day.”
In addition, Jesse Conte, Keith Hinson and Doug Rogers of the Alabama Baptist State Board of Missions (SBOM) won a first place award from BCA for the magazine One Mission.
Rogers, along with Curry Evans of the SBOM, won another first place award for the music video “Non Nobis Domine.” They also won a second place award for the audio magazine One Mission. And Conte was chosen as a BCA finalist for his 2006 Bible Drill T-shirt.
Rogers will serve as national BCA program chair for the coming year. The BCA national meeting will take place in Mobile next year.
Brian Maxwell Smith of Shades Mountain Baptist Church, Vestavia Hills, won a second place award from BCA for “A Pumpkin Tale Coloring Book” and was named a finalist in general design and illustration for “Extreme!”
Samford University’s office of communications also won several honors from both RCC and BCA.
Scott Camp, senior graphic designer, won two RCC Awards of Excellence for the spring 2005 Ministry Enrichment Workshops brochure produced for Beeson Divinity School. The brochure also received second place in BCA’s two-color brochure design division.
Also recognized by RCC were Seasons magazine in the local/regional magazine category, the 2005 President’s Report in the annual report category and the Samford traditions poster, which was produced for new students, in the posters category. All three projects involved multiple communications staff members.
First place BCA awards went to the communications office for the 2006 President’s Report and a series of publications related to Samford’s 2005 freshmen orientation program.
Philip Poole, executive director of university communications at Samford, was elected national RCC president.
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