Category: Advocacy

Winner, winner. Chicken dinner.

Okay, well you don’t actually get a chicken dinner, but you do get some bragging rights. Here’s a breakdown of all our amazing winners in the 2022 Columnist Contest (for works created in 2021): Editorial Cartoon First Place – Sage Stossel, The Boston Globe Social Justice First Place – John W. Fountain, Chicago Sun-TimesSecond Place…

To go or not to go? That is the question.

by Daniela Gitlin, MD  The NSNC conference is scheduled to happen live June 9-12, 2022 at the Doubletree by Hilton, Birmingham Perimeter Park in Alabama. You, like me, might be of two minds about attending. You might have various COVID-related concerns. But also, you might really, really want to go.  Do you crave contact, with real people, in real-time,…

2021 Is Done

by John Branning 2021 is done – it won’t be called the greatest year.Covid we could not outrun, with Omicron the latest fear. Sports went on despite the risk; tried protocols to make it safe.Jeffrey Epstein’s odalisque got jail time for procuring naifs. Trump impeached a second time, because of insurrectionists.NFTs arrive and I’m confused:…

The 2022 Birmingham Conference Will Happen!

By Suzette Martinez Standring, Director Emeritus Our Birmingham conference is back on track! The in-person event is set for Thursday-Sunday, June 9-12, 2022, with educational, awards and activities scheduled to take place on Friday and Saturday. The venue will be at the DoubleTree by Hilton Birmingham Perimeter Park. How safe is it? A Zoom meeting with…

Adam Earnheardt Chosen to Serve as Interim Executive Director

Adam Earnheardt

By Telly Halkias, NSNC Board Secretary Adam Earnheardt has been chosen by the NSNC board of directors to serve as the organization’s interim executive director. Adam brings executive leadership experience to the NSNC. Aside from serving as executive director for the Ohio Communication Association for 5 years, and currently serving as executive director for the Youngstown…

Writing as a Tool to Face America’s Past

FREE event but registration required HERE. Rochelle Riley ended a nearly 20-year career as a nationally syndicated, award-winning Detroit columnist in 2019 to become the City of Detroit’s Director of Arts and Culture. In that role, she guides the city’s investment in the arts and creates opportunities for transformative innovation. Her most recent project was the…

The Heart and Art Expands

During her writing days, Mom won NSNC awards twice, at least, for her much-loved, long-running humor column “Coffee Break” which appeared weekly in the Maine Sunday Telegram.

Introducing Our New Executive Director

By Cassie McClureNSNC Executive Director You can blame bad salsa. I do. That’s how my column-writing history started. I had already been doing food reviews steadily for a few years when a perturbed restaurant owner came into the newsroom to complain about my commentary on his watery salsa. Unfortunately for him, I was, and am,…

Join Me in the Zoom Where It Happens

Curtis HoneycuttNSNC Treasurer and Conference Committee I can’t begin to explain how much the NSNC has meant to me over the past three years. I met many of you word warriors in Cincinnati in 2018, back when it was possible to rub shoulders with other humans. In 2019, many of us spent a weekend in…

Emerging Social Platforms: Pick One and Run with It

By Rebecca RegnierNSNC Member There’s no question social media can be confusing. Just when you figure out one platform, it changes, or another emerges. Should I be on Facebook, Twitter, Snapchat? The landscape is littered with the bodies of dead social media platforms. Watch out. You just stepped in a pile of MySpace! But the…

Tony Messenger: How One Story Snowballed into a Series That Changed Missouri Law

By Suzette Martinez StandringDirector Emeritus Newsroom reporters and columnists may see themselves when NSNC Member and metro columnist Tony Messenger of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch will share how paying attention, listening, and strong storytelling led to a series of columns that won him the 2019 Pulitzer Prize for Commentary. He will be a featured speaker…

A Talk with David Maraniss

David Maraniss – the two-time Pulitzer Prize Winner and award-winning biographer talked to NSNC Communications Director Bonnie Jean Feldkamp about his writing process.