NSNC 2026 Columnist Contest - Now Open

Sunshine Week March 15-21, 2026

Consider a Gift to the NSNC Education Foundation

Join NSNC and Reap the Benefits!

NSNC 2026 Columnist Contest - Now Open

Contest submissions now open! We are accepting entries from columnists, bloggers, and serial essayists  for our 2026 Annual Columnist Contest (for work published in 2025). We will accept entries from columnists, bloggers, and serial essayists published in 2025.  Everyone is welcome to submit. You don’t have to be an NSNC member.

Sunshine Week March 15-21, 2026

We’re counting down to #SunshineWeek 2026, March 15-21. Together, we champion #OpenRecords and #OpenGovernment nationwide March 15-21. #FOIA #transparency. Free resources: sunshineweek.org

Consider a Gift to the NSNC Education Foundation

The National Society of Newspaper Columnists Education Foundation is a tax-exempt charitable organization [501(c)3] devoted to the education and training of new and experienced columnists everywhere. Donate here: https://www.paypal.com/paypalme/NSNCEdFnd

Join NSNC and Reap the Benefits!

We are excited for What’s in-store for NSNC members this year. We are gearing up to launch the NSNC Annual Columnist Contest on January 15, so you’ll want to be sure your membership is up-to-date. Also, if you have ideas, suggestions, etc., please share them with our President Meredith Cummings at meredithcummings@gmail.com or Executive Director Ginny McCabe at nsncdirector@gmail.com. Thank you for your support of NSNC!

Ask Alex: Who Owns My Columns?

Dear Alex: I have been working hard on my book. It’s a compilation of about 80 of my columns from the last seven years. However, when I uploaded the completed manuscript to my preferred self-publishing software, it was flagged because the content “is freely available on the web” and they were “unable to verify your…

A Bold Punctuation Prediction for 2018

By Curtis Honeycutt NSNC Member Welcome to the golden age of outrage. If you’re just finishing a three-year social media cleanse, I’ve got some bad news for you: people are ticked off. People are royally ticked about pretty much everything: guns, kneeling, not kneeling, walls, refugees, Starbucks (in general), and anything that remotely resembles a…

Happy National Columnists’ Day 2018!

Thank you for a fantastic 2018 celebration! See the photos collected below. If we missed your photo please send it to me so I can add it to the collection! In honor of the anniversary of columnist Ernie Pyle’s death, we celebrate columnists everywhere and of every type via social media with this hashtag #IAmAColumnist. …

Keynote Speaker José Antonio Vargas Exemplifies the Power of Narrative

By Suzette Martinez Standring NSNC Executive Director Putting a human face to a controversial issue is more difficult when that face is your own.  NSNC keynote speaker José Antonio Vargas, founder of Define American, will share his story and the power of narrative at the NSNC’s Will Rogers Humanitarian Award banquet on Friday, June 8,…

It’s All in the Bag: Cornhole in Cincinnati

By Lisa Smith Molinari NSNC President With April being a month prized for foolishness, I felt it appropriate to announce NSNC’s first-ever Cornhole Tournament, scheduled for Saturday, June 9, 3:30 pm, during our Cincinnati conference. In the past, fun-loving NSNCers have eagerly participated in ill-fated competitions during downtime between annual conference sessions. In 1996, there…

How to Write Your Most Popular Column of the Year

You, the Columnist By Dave Lieber Dallas Morning News columnist My newspaper added a new tag word for stories. Joining “courts,” “crime,” and “education” is this one: #UpliftingNews. These two words are the key to big stories in 2018. The American audience is so burned out by the brutal news of late that anything that…