Photo credit: Masthead photo courtesy of Greg Wagoner Photography via Creative Commons license on Flickr.
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Greetings from the Indiana Professional chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists. Our organization works to promote and protect First Amendment freedoms and encourages training for current and future journalists by offering professional development opportunities and college journalism scholarships. We also recognize the accomplishments of the state’s top journalists through the annual Best of Indiana Journalism Awards. Our chapter is proud to represent journalists in Indiana, birthplace and modern-day home of the national Society of Professional Journalists.
Get all our latest news below and use the menus to link to information about scholarships, contests and our events. Thanks for visiting.
Journalism students at IUPUI have formed a new campus chapter of SPJ.
To celebrate, the student chapter will host a “Slice & Dice” at the new Student Media Center from 11:30 a.m. to 2 p.m. April 15. The “slice” is free pizza; the “dice” is a critique of student portfolios.
That’s where professional journalists like you come in. The chapter is in search of professional journalists willing to meet with students and critique their portfolios — plus answer questions about the industry.
If you would be willing to volunteer your time, contact IUPUI student Tara Puckey at tarapuckey@me.com or (765) 381-0927.
You’re invited to a free workshop in Indianapolis on March 10: “Investigating the Business of College Athletics” with Pulitzer Prize winner Buzz Bissinger.
The class will teach you how to dig into the finances of your local college’s athletic program.
 Buzz Bissinger (shown at right), Pulitzer winner and best-selling author of Friday Night Lights, and Rob King, vice president and editor-in-chief of ESPN Digital Media, will headline a distinguished group of trainers for this daylong workshop.
Joining them will be Jodi Upton, sports database editor for USA Today; Steve Berkowitz, sports projects editor at USA Today; and Wallace Renfro, vice president and senior adviser to the president of the NCAA.
The seminar, which will be on the eve of the Big Ten Basketball Tournament in Indianapolis, is sponsored by the Donald W. Reynolds National Center for Business Journalism at Arizona State University and hosted by the National Sports Journalism Center at Indiana University’s IUPUI campus and the Associated Press Sports Editors.
The workshop is free, but space is limited. Sign up today! (Can’t make it? Check out our online training.)
Continue reading Free workshop in Indy: Investigating the busines of college sports
SPJ honors daily publications with Sigma Delta Chi Awards
Gain national recognition. Be honored by your contemporaries.
Celebrate journalism.
The Sigma Delta Chi Awards
contest deadline is
Friday, Feb. 12.
The awards honor excellence in professional journalism and are given annually by the Society of Professional Journalists. Please view the award categories to learn more about entering your work!
Our new online submission process allows you to enter easily and efficiently. You can read more about last year’s winners in the 2009 awards issue of Quill magazine. National winners will be honored at the SPJ National Convention Oct. 3-6 in Las Vegas.
We encourage you to enter your work as soon as possible. The closer we get to the deadline, the busier our servers become with entrants’ activities. DEADLINE: Friday, Feb. 12.
The Society of Professional Journalists is proud to offer cutting-edge professional development for everyone in the journalism industry. With the coming spring, SPJ continues this tradition with its 2010 spring journalism conference in Chicago, Ill., that is specifically held for journalists from Illinois, Indiana and Kentucky. The conference is March 26-27 and will offer plenty of great programming for all attendees, from seasoned professionals to students.
Spend the weekend with fellow journalists networking and learning from the industry’s best and brightest. Three outstanding speakers are confirmed for the event; click here to learn more about their backgrounds and the issues they’ll discuss. The conference also features professional development sessions on a variety of issues like freelancing, multimedia, journalism ethics and new journalism business models.
A special thank-you to Loyola University Chicago (Downtown Water Tower Campus) for their in-kind donation of meeting space. The event will be co-hosted by the Loyola University Chicago student chapter of SPJ.
Read more about the schedule and accommodations and register online today.
The conference is open to any and all, not just SPJ members. Please share this information with your friends and colleagues.
PLEASE NOTE: If you register by March 9 you will receive the early-registration fees! The price for professional non SPJ members is $90; the student non-member price is $70. After March 9, the price for professional non SPJ members is $110 and $90 for student non SPJ members.
Take advantage of the early prices and register today! This is a conference you do not want to miss.
Contact Heather Porter at (317) 927-8000 ext. 204 if you have questions.
We hope to see you in Chicago!
Karen Grabowski
SPJ Communications Coordinator
Announcing the 31st Annual Best in Indiana Journalism Awards, recognizing outstanding performance in journalism in 2009, sponsored by the Indiana Professional Chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists.
Finally, you, your colleagues, and your organization can gain the recognition you deserve in the state’s only “open” Indiana journalism contest. Entrants do not need to be members of SPJ, and entries can be submitted by news organizations or individuals.
The contest showcases the best in Indiana journalism, funds SPJ scholarship programs, and allows your name to be heralded at the awards banquet. This year, the banquet will take place Friday, April 23 at the Indianapolis Marriott North, 3645 River Crossing Parkway. Enter your journalism triumphs, and mark your calendars now!
ALL ENTRIES MUST BE RECEIVED BY 5 P.M. FEBRUARY 1, 2010.
IMPORTANT DOWNLOADS
Categories brochure: Professional
Categories brochure: Student
Call for entries / professional and student contest form
Special honors nomination form
Contest entries will be accepted by mail or online at www.spjcontest.com after December 31, 2009. See the brochure for important details.
For questions, please email contest coordinator Rob Higley or call him at 317-578-1440.
The Indiana Professional chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists will post the 2009 Best in Indiana Journalism Awards categories in the coming days. This year the contest will accept online submissions in most print, radio and Web categories.
Some other highlights:
· Nominations are accepted from news organizations or individuals.
· Nominees need not be members of the Society of Professional
Journalists.
· All entries must have been published or broadcast during calendar
year 2009. A series of stories must have started publication or broadcast in 2009.
· Award submissions must be received by 5 p.m. Friday, February 1.
· For questions, contact Rob Higley, contest coordinator, at (317)
578-1440 or rhigley@revealconsulting.com.
Three members of the chapter’s Board of Directors have met with the new state public access counselor, telling him of SPJ’s longtime advocacy for open government.
Access Counselor Andrew Kossack said during the meeting that he wanted to be active in informing the public and government officials about the state’s Access to Public Records and Open Door laws. He mentioned doing so through education sessions and use of the office’s Web site.
Kossack comes to the access counselor position after working in labor and employment law at the Indianapolis firm of Barnes & Thornburg for two years. He says during that time he was “on the business end” of some government records request denials.
SPJ Project Sunshine state chairman Gerry Lanosga told Kossack of SPJ’s support for creation of the access counselor’s office in 1998 after a group of Indiana newspapers detailed the failure of many local government officials to follow the public records law. Chapter President Amy Wimmer Schwarb and Chapter Secretary Tom Davies also attended the meeting.
Dear SPJ members,
SPJ leaders are outraged that the Obama administration has reversed course and is now proposing changes that essentially render useless S. 448, more commonly known as the Free Flow of Information Act. If implemented, the administration’s changes would weaken the proposed shield law and offer little to no protection to reporters who refuse to disclose confidential sources.
Click here for the SPJ news release.
Most frustrating to SPJ is that the administration’s latest stance is an about face to the support the administration gave early in the process. The revisions are in direct opposition to the promises President Obama made regarding a federal shield law during his campaign and his previous actions as a senator.
It is up to us now to hold President Obama to his promise and to encourage the administration to reconsider its position and focus on the importance of a federal shield law and how vital it is to the existence of a free press and an informed citizenry.
Voice your support!
One way we encourage you - and all journalists - to support S. 448 is by writing editorials or asking your news outlet to write editorials about the federal shield law. Let’s use our tools to help the Obama administration get back on track.
Another more direct option is to contact the White House directly. Use this online contact form to express your disappointment for the revisions the administration made to the federal shield law bill. SPJ provides the following letter, which you can copy and paste into the White House’s online contact form, as an option for your correspondence to President Obama. We also encourage you to write your own letter to show the varying opinions from our members:
Continue reading SPJ Legislative Alert: Shield law in danger
 We express condolences at the death of longtime Ball State University journalism professor Earl Conn. He died Sept. 20 in Muncie at the age of 82.
Dr. Conn worked at various publications and was a high school teacher before permanently joining the Ball State faculty in 1964. He became journalism department chairman in 1984 and was founding dean of the university’s College of Communication, Information and Media in 1996. He retired from Ball State in 1998, a year after he was inducted into the Indiana Journalism Hall of Fame. Conn wrote six books, most recently “My Indiana: 101 More Places To See.”
Indianapolis Star executive editor Juli Metzger told The Star Press of Muncie: “He was not just a champion for journalism but also a wonderful historian, photographer, travel writer and just decent man.”
For more, see Ball State’s announcement on Dr. Conn’s death.
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