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APA Editorial Contest deadline approaches Guest Column:
Stop fake news by paying for the real thing by David Chavern
ARKANSAS
Ar kansas
PRESS
Publisher Weekly
Vol. 14 | No. 14 | Thursday, April 4, 2019
ASSOCIATION
Serving Press and State Since 1873
Voice’s Highfill recognized among E&P’s 25 under 35 The awards just keep coming for Stephanie Dodson Highfill of the Hot Springs Village Voice.
women selected, including Highfill, “believe in the power of journalism and they’re working to make sure it has a future.”
motivation and ambition. I’m very proud of Stephanie, she has accomplished so much in such a short period of time.”
Highfill, last year’s “Best of Show” winner at the Arkansas Press Association’s Better Newspaper Advertising Contest, was selected for a prestigious national honor in 2019. She’s one of the 25 young newspaper professionals nationwide honored on the Editor & Publisher “25 under 35” list.
Highfill is a self-taught graphic designer. She watched internet tutorials about Adobe software such as InDesign, Photoshop and Illustrator to learn her craft. In learning design, she brought specific skills and added value to her role in advertising sales at the newspaper. Designing spec ads before she goes to see a client tends to lead to better sales results, she said.
Highfill has been with the Voice just over three years. It’s her first job in the newspaper industry, and she credits Robert Lane, the newspaper’s former production manager, for helping her as she started in the industry with “not one bit of design experience.”
Editor & Publisher, the newspaper industry’s trade magazine, selected 25 leaders who, according to the magazine, are “the next generation of newspaper leaders who want to keep the industry moving.” The magazine said that, while newspapers continue transforming, the 25 men and
“We are very blessed to have someone as talented as Stephanie on our team,” said Jennifer Allen, group publisher for GateHouse Media, which owns the Hot Springs Village Voice. “She has a positive, confident approach with advertisers that stems from her high degree of self-
Before working at the Voice, Highfill sold auto parts. As a multimedia sales executive at the newspaper, she helped the Voice last year achieve a 70 percent increase in digital growth from 2017 to 2018, according to the Editor & Publisher profile. In that article, Allen said Highfill is “a goContinued on Page 2
Gov. Hutchinson signs student journalist protections into law ceremonial bill signing of HB 1231. The bill, now Act 395, provides additional protections for student journalists at Arkansas’s public colleges and universities. Act 395 was sponsored by Rep. Mark Lowery, R-Maumelle, who is also pictured. Act 395 ensures that student journalists have a right to free expression and it strengthens protections for student media advisers.
Representatives of the newspaper industry and university journalism programs
from across Arkansas joined Gov. Asa Hutchinson on Monday, April 1, for a
Also in attendance for the ceremonial bill signing were other legislators, representatives of the Arkansas Press Association and Society of Professional Journalists, and faculty and students from Henderson State University, Arkansas Tech University and the University of Arkansas at Little Rock.