Friday, Dec. 7, 2012

Northern Star, Campus Life Building, NIU-DeKalb

Also a General Membership meeting

Present: (12) Larry Lough, John Etheredge, John

Puterbaugh, Lonny Cain, Jim Killam, Jim Slonoff, Sharon Boehlefeld, Roger Ruthhart, Jason Schaumburg, Penny Wiegert, Randy Swikle, Wally Haas.

Absent (6): Kathy Gresey, Marc Colosimo, Jeff Wisser, Nick Swedberg, Jason Akst, Dirk Johnson.

Guest: Shelley Hendricks, Northern Star adviser.

Three board seats are open.

Schaumburg called the meeting to order at 10:05 a.m.

Oct. 18 minutes were approved unanimously. (Haas motion / Ruthhart second)

Treasurer’s Report

Slonoff reported balances of $10,294.41 in checking and $5.94 in savings. Deposits since the last meeting include $190 in membership dues and $585 in Fall Conference revenue. Expenditures were $1,000 to Matt Marton, winner of the Excellence in Journalism Award; $233.71 to the Northern Star for Spring Conference expenses; and $75.15 to the Ledger-Sentinel for plaques. NINA has not yet received the Fall Conference bill from NIU.

Executive Secretary’s Report: None

President’s Report
Schaumburg thanked board members for their participation this year, in particular as NINA has revisited its mission and made structural adjustments. To that end, all present were invited to participate in the general membership vote on changes to the constitution and bylaws. Those changes passed unanimously (Lough / Etheredge).

Board members Nick Swedberg and Mark Colosimo have resigned because of changes in their job situations. That leaves five open seats under the old structure; the new structure simply requires at least 15 board members.

Northern Star adviser Shelley Hendricks was elected to the board for a three year term. (Killam / Haas). Gresey and Slonoff were elected to new three-year terms (Cain / Lough). So, entering 2013, the board has 17 members.

Committee Reports

Program Committee: Lough said the Fall Conference was a success.

Education Committee: Etheredge asked about new ways NINA’s annual scholarship competition could be promoted to high school students and advisers. Along with the regular mailing, suggestions included using the IJEA listserv, and posting a link to high school newspapers’ Facebook pages. Announcement of the competition usually is sent in January, with a March 15 application deadline.

Membership Committee: Haas said he now represents the Freeport Journal Standard as well as the Rockford Register Star. Both are Gatehouse newspapers.

Resource Committee: Killam said he will hand communication coordinator responsibilities off to Hendricks as of Dec. 31. He plans to remain on the board while still living in the area.

Old Business

None.

New Business

2013 officers were elected (Cain motion / Ruthhart second). They are:

President: Larry Lough

First Vice President: Kathy Gresey

Second Vice President: John Puterbaugh

Executive Secretary: Dirk Johnson

Treasurer: Jim Slonoff

Immediate Past President: indian pharmacy online Jason Schaumburg

Communications Coordinator: Shelley Hendricks

New committees as a result of the bylaws changes are Executive, Outreach, Training (dealing with professional training) and Education (dealing with colleges and high schools). Board members, or any NINA member or employee of a member publication, are encouraged to join a committee. To volunteer, contact Lough before the Jan. 18 meeting.

Slonoff proposed that the board help the Northern Star pay for a phone line in its conference room, which will allow for conference calls. This will be useful during NINA meetings if the board needs to hear from a member who is absent. The installation charge is about $650. NINA would pay for a maximum of $250, with the balance to be shared by the Northern Star and Northern Star Alumni. This is a one-time charge. The board approved unanimously ((Slonoff / Wiegert).

Randy Swikle asked board members to be aware of Jan. 13 as the 25^th anniversary of the U.S. Supreme Court’s Hazelwood v. Kuhlmeier decision, which has been used to justify censorship of high school newspapers (and at times, college newspapers). He cited examples of school administrators taking this decision far beyond what the law allows, in effort to control student voices and not allow anything controversial in student papers. Swikle asked newspapers to consider publishing editorials on Jan. 13, emphasizing the teaching of the First Amendment in practice, not just in theory. “There are other oversight strategies much more effective than prior review,” he said.

2013 meeting dates were set. They are:

Jan. 18

March 15

June 21

Sept. 6

Oct. 24 (Fall Conference)

Dec. 6

Next meeting: 10 a.m. Friday, Jan. 18, 2013, at the Northern Star

Adjourn 11:10 a.m.

on.

andyshaw1

andyshaw2

thanks to Maria Krull and Shelley Hendricks at

the Northern Star for coordinating this year’s contest.

held at 10 a.m. at the Northern Star office, Campus Life Building, NIU-DeKalb. Anyone who works at a NINA member publication, or who is an individual member, is invited to attend (but attendance is not required for membership).

View the proposed changes HERE.

Thursday, Oct. 18, 2012

NIU Convocation Center, NIU-DeKalb

Present: (13) Larry Lough, John Etheredge, John Puterbaugh, Lonny Cain, Jim Killam, Jim Slonoff, Sharon Boehlefeld, Kathy Gresey, Roger Ruthhart,

Jason Schaumburg, Penny

Wiegert, Jason Akst, Dirk Johnson.

Absent (5): Randy Swikle, Marc Colosimo, Jeff Wisser, Nick Swedberg, Wally Haas

Three board seats are open.

Schaumburg called the meeting to order at 5:35 p.m.

Sept. 7 minutes were approved unanimously. (Ruthhart motion / Wiegert second)

Treasurer’s Report

Slonoff reported balances of $10,614.56 in checking and $5.94 in savings. A $1,000 check will be written

tonight to the winner of the Excellence in Journalism contest.

Executive Secretary’s Report

Johnson said about 100 people are expected for the Fall Conference tonight. The NIU Communication Department has generously subsidized the event this year, which has allowed many faculty, high school and college students and high school advisers to attend.

President’s Report
Schaumburg said the eight-member task force met Sept. 28 and outlined three main areas of focus for NINA: training, education and networking. Future committee structure and board makeup will reflect these priorities. The task force also proposed some revisions to NINA’s constitution and bylaws, which will be discussed under New Business.

Committee Reports

None

Old Business

Mugs: Castle PrinTech of DeKalb has sponsored coffee mugs for all attendees tonight, Wiegert said.

New Business

The board unanimously agreed to propose the Task Force’s changes to the NINA constitution and bylaws to the general membership (Cain motion, Gresey second). This requires a vote during a general membership meeting, with at least 30 days notice. The general membership meeting will be held simultaneously with the next board meeting Dec. 7, and members will be invited.

Next meeting: 10 a.m. Friday, Dec. 7, at the Northern Star

Adjourn 5:50 p.m.

Matt Marton (right) chats w

ith Kane County Chronicle editor Kathy Gresey and State Rep. Bob Pritchard after Thursday’s NINA awards banquet at NIU.

Matt Marton, a photographer for the Southtown Star, has won NINA’s Excellence in Journalism Award and the accompanying $1,000 prize for his work on the series, “Haiti: Two Years Later.”

The award was presented Thursday night at NINA’s 50th Anniversary Fall Conference, at the Northern Illinois University Convocation Center. The Excellence in Journalism competition invited journalists to submit their best piece of work, published between May 1, 2011, and April 30, 2012.

Here are judges’ remarks about Marton’s work:

In February 2012, the Southtown Star send photographer Matt Marton and reporter Donna Vickroy to Haiti. “We wanted to find out where cargo containers full of shoes, bicycles, medical supplies and musical instruments, donated by our readers, ended up,” Marton wrote. “In following the trail of compassion, we hoped to form a bridge, built on communication and understanding, from here to Haiti.”

Marton’s stunning series of photos didn’t just follow that trail of compassion. It stirred it anew in readers. It’s difficult to imagine any reader being confronted with these photos and not feeling changed. This series –

both the photos and the words – shines the light of truth and compassion on the people of Haiti, for the benefit of an audience who may have given money, time and/or prayer for them. It’s a sterling example of the type of journalism that newspapers still must find a way to produce – despite budget crunches and staff shortages.

Not insignificant is that this series comes from a newspaper whose newsroom has been gutted by layoffs in recent years. Yet, the Southtown Star saw an opportunity to connect local efforts to an international story that’s fallen from the public eye but is every bit as urgent as it was two years ago. The paper made a significant investment to send these two journalists to Haiti for five days. The journalists stepped into harm’s way at times, witnessed the horror of extreme poverty, and also chronicled hope for better days.

Vickroy’s heroic series of stories was a runner-up, and ordinarily could have won a competition like this. But in this case, judges felt that Marton’s Pulitzer-quality photos were so compelling that they merited singular attention.

Thank you to the Southtown Star for seeing the value and importance of this story. Congratulations to Matt Marton, and thank you for the reminder of why most of us became journalists – to tell stories like this, and to make a difference in the world.

See this series at the Southtown Star website

Matt Marton’s blog

has purchased Suburban Life publications and affiliated operations from GateHouse Media. The purchase is effective today.

arget=”_blank”>Full story from the Daily Chronicle.

50 years, for a presentation during NINA’s Fall Conference on Oct. 18. Does your publication have anything that would make a good addition?

If so, pick 1-3 of your best photos and email them, in JPG format, by Oct. 1 Oct. 5 (deadline extended), to Jim Killam, jimkillam(at)gmail(dot)com.

The Fall Conference will be held Thursday evening, Oct. 18, at the Northern Illinois University Convocation Center in DeKalb. The keynote speaker is Andy Shaw, longtime Chicago newspaper and TV news reporter and currently president and CEO of the Better Government Association.

Andy Shaw

Shaw has long been one of Chicago’s most prominent journalists — in television and print before that,” said Dirk Johnson, NINA executive secretary. “He now shines a bright light on the unsavory and shadowy in Illinois government. NINA is honored to welcome him in discussing the role of journalists in watching the foxes near the chicken coops.”

Shaw spent 37 years covering politics, business and education and general assignments for City News Bureau, the Chicago Sun-Times, NBC 5 and ABC 7. He was ABC 7’s political reporter, retiring after the Obama inauguration in 2009. He’s an Evanston native and an alumnus of the University of Illinois at Chicago.

The BGA “works for integrity, transparency, and accountability in government by exposing corruption and inefficiency; identifying and advocating effective public policy; and engaging and mobilizing the electorate to achieve authentic and responsible reform,” according to its mission statement. The association’s Investigative Unit tackles waste, fraud and corruption in local and state government, and publicizes the results through local media partnerships.

Special guests and a multimedia presentation will look back on NINA’s 50-year history, beginning with its founding in 1962 by Dr. Donald Grubb, founder of the NIU journalism department.

Judging is complete and we’ll award the annual winners in 23 categories for both daily and nondaily publications. Plus, we’ll announce the winner of the NINA Excellence in Journalism Award. This special contest rewards what our judges panel considers the best single work of journalism over the past year. The winner gets $1,000 in cash from NINA.

The dinner is being subsidized this year both by NINA and by the NIU Department of Communication. That means the evening’s cost, including dinner and program, is just $15 a person for NINA members and employees of member publications. Registration deadline is Friday, Oct. 5. Register HERE.

NINA 2012 Fall Conference

50^th Anniversary Celebration
Thursday, Oct. 18, 2012
NIU Convocation Center
1525 W. Lincoln Highway
DeKalb, Illinois

Program

6 p.m. Cash bar

7 p.m. Dinner

7:45 p.m. Keynote speaker Andy Shaw

8:15 p.m. Awards

Cost: $15 for NINA members and employees of member publications. $25 for nonmembers. Payable at the door. Please register by Friday, Oct. 5.

Parking is free in the NIU Convocation Center lot.

For more information, call 815-753-0707.

Editors and publishers: We can tell you in advance who from your staff won awards, but we can’t tell you what place they won.