Editori’s note: This story has been updated to correct a misspelling of Curtis Wildfong’s first name.
HOLLAND (WHTC) — The Holland Sentinel’s newsroom staff is glowing these days. Several of the newspaper’s 2015 stories earned Michigan Press Association honors, awarded at the MPA’s recent conference.
Though the paper didn’t pick up first place awards, the journalists grabbed two second place awards, two third place and one honorable mention.
Editor Sarah Leach praised the reporters for skilled work.
“You have to have an inherent curiously as a reporter, in order to be successful,” she said, “And then you also have to have some really good perople skills, in terms of getting people to talk to you.”
Two reporters, Curtis Wildfong and Amy Biolchini, picked up second-place and honorable mentions. Wildfong’s stories about police shooting training and a murder victim’s mother’s search for justice were honored.
Biolchini’s Sentinel story on Holland Public Schools’ efforts to help low-income and minority students reach academic parity with their white counterparts pick up a second place award. A Whitmore Lake story she file for The Ann Arbor News, prior to her Sentinel hiring, picked up an honorable mention.
It’s the most MPA awards for The Sentinel since 2011, when the paper picked up seven.
Leach remains optimistic about next year’s MPA award chances, despite her newsroom staff using temporary quarters (in the former Lighthouse Insurance building on Holland’s Eighth Street), as the Sentinel’s historic home is renovated. She said reporters will continue working out of the temporary office until at least July, which could make covering Tulip Time complicated.
“At least we’re still on the parade route,” she quipped.
Hear WHTC’s interview with Sarah Leach.
The honored stories:
Second place
Government/Education news. Reporter: Amy Biolchini “Justice for all” How Holland Public Schools is helping students of color and of low socioeconomic status do as well as their white peers.
Best column. Reporter: Curtis Wildfong, Photographer: Emily Brouwer “Training Day” Wildfong goes through police training to see how officers develop instincts and muscle memory to navigate unknown situations.
Third place
Sports Feature. Reporter: Greg Buckner “Pinning death” Wrestler overcomes near-death experience to thrive at sport once again.
Spot News. Reporter: Jim Hayden “Military tragedy“: Story detailed the death of a Holland Marine in a helicopter crash.
Honorable mentions
Spot news Reporter: Curtis Wildfong “No closer to closure” Mother of murder victim frustrated with county officials in lack of conclusive answers in case.
(For Division A entry from The Ann Arbor News) Reporter Amy Biolchini (with Lindsay Knake) Whitmore Lake annexation.
