SESSION LEADERS
University of South Alabama Mobile, Alabama September 22, 2014
Lauren Erdman, is the Volunteer and Outreach Activities Coordinator at Bay Area Food Bank. She graduated from the University of Alabama in May with a Journalism degree and is from Mobile. She hopes to work as a PR or communications professional for a non-profit organization in the future. Fun fact: She is obsessed with anything Disney and actually lived in Orlando and worked at Disney World for a six-month internship.
Emily Hill is a reporter for the Mobile Press-Register and AL.com. She’s a 2014 graduate of Spring Hill College where she received her bachelor’s degree in journalism. Throughout her college career she had work published on AL.com and the Mobile Press-Register, in Mobile Bay Magazine, Sense Magazine and the Lagniappe. She also received the John Will Journalism Scholarship, the Public Relations Council of Alabama Award of Merit for a website project, the Catholic Press Award, and was inducted into the National Communication Association Honor Society Lambda Pi Eta. Erin Coggins, MJE, advises the yearbook and newspaper at Sparkman High School in Harvest. She is president of the Alabama Scholastic Press Association Board of Directors. She has been named the Susie DeMent Adviser of the Year twice and was recently recognized as a Special Recognition Adviser by the Dow Jones Newspaper Fund. She was also awarded the 2007 Columbia Scholastic Press Association’s Gold Key, and she is a Dow Jones Distinguished Adviser. Meredith Cummings, CJE, journalism instructor at The University of Alabama, is President of the Society of Professional Journalists Alabama Professional Chapter and advises the Capstone Association of Black Journalists. She directs the National Elementary School Press Association, the Alabama Scholastic Press Association and the Multicultural Journalism Workshop at UA. Cummings was a newspaper, online and magazine reporter for 16 years before her current position, and she writes for AL.com where her blog, The Up Beat, won second place nationally in the 2014 National Federation of Press Women contest. Connie Nolen is an English teacher and chair of the English Department at Pelham High School in Pelham, Alabama. She is the Pelham Community Columnist for the Shelby County Reporter and the Pelham Reporter. She is also the vice-president of the Alabama Scholastic Press Association, a member of the RUMC Christian Writers and the Southern Christian Writers associations. She lives in Pelham and describes herself as “a teacher, an avid reader, a writer, a mom, a community volunteer, a runner and an exerciser.”
Alabama Scholastic Press Association 2014
FALL REGIONAL WORKSHOPS
WELCOME
8:30 a.m. AUDITORIUM
Meredith Cummings Director, Alabama Scholastic Press Association
8:30 . . KEYNOTE SPEAKER AUDITORIUM am
Emily Hill “Exploring Journalism: Reaching Beyond Pen and Paper� Hill is a news reporter for AL.com in Mobile, as well as the Mobile Press Register. In the past, she has worked with Sense Magazine and interned at Mobile Bay Monthly Magazine, WALA FOX 10 News and the Lagniappe.
SESSION 1
9:30 a.m.
How to Cram for the Yearbook, Erin Coggins Room 171 Yearbook staffs want to cover everything, but how can they when pages are limited? This session offers staffers advice on how to increase coverage by including a variety of mods. This session is interactive. Make Your Lit Mag a Creative Leadership Team, Connie Nolen Room 181 Learn how to get every writer, photographer and artist in your school invested in your lit mag. Be a magazine staff and also be a team of artistic leaders. Tools, Tips and Tricks for Journalists, Meredith Cummings Auditorium This session will provide you with dozens of ideas on how to get the most from your media outlet through apps, websites and social media tools. From print to video, this session will leave you with oodles of resources to explore and use when you go home.
SESSION 2
10:30 a.m.
A Picture is Worth a Thousand Words, Erin Coggins Room 181 Want to improve your interviewing skills? This session will use a backwards approach to ensure that staffers are asking the right questions to get the best story. Photo tips will also be given. This session will be interactive so get your phones ready! Submissions, Submissions, Connie Nolen Room 171 How to get them, when to say enough is enough and what to do with those submissions!
SESSION 3
11:30 a.m.
Using the Critique for More than Awards, Erin Coggins Room 171 This session will use the National Scholastic Press Association guidelines to make your book even better. Tips on preparing your book for critique for national competition will also be discussed. This session is interactive. Stay Away From Cliches, Lauren Erdman Auditorium This session will help students explore ways to think outside the overdone, tired cliched newspaper stories. It will offer alternatives and new ways to twist overdone stories. Leadership Structure in Literary Magazines, Connie Nolen Room 181 How can a staff of creative people become an organized group that gets a magazine published?
JOIN US IN FEBRUARY: STATE CONVENTION Join us for the Alabama Scholastic Press Association State Convention February 13-14 at the Ferguson Student Center on The University of Alabama campus in Tuscaloosa. For more information as it becomes available, visit our website at aspa.ua.edu.