Editor Erin Geismar Selected for New York Times Institute

Ithacan editor in chief Erin Geismar has been selected for this year’s New York Times Student Journalism Institute, to be held during winter break in Miami.
The institute offers student journalists an opportunity to work with prominent professionals in a newsroom environment. All expenses for students are paid, including transportation, and the students receive a stipend.
Nic Barajas ’08 attended last year’s institute. Now he’s designing pages for the Times.

Alumni Come to Town

Last weekend’s Park Scholar Alumni Board meeting brought a number of former Ithacan editors to town. We got to see Joe Geraghty ’04 and his wife Brenda (Ludwig) ’03; Katie Maslanka ’06, who is now doing campus ministry work in Denver; and Michelle (Theis) Cuthrell ’04.
Perhaps best of all, we finally got to meet Michelle’s 2-year-old son, Connor (shown with Michelle above), who was excited about his new baby brother or sister scheduled to arrive in April.
We also had dinner with Nic Barajas ’08, who happened to be in town as well. And they tell us the legendary Bill Earl ’08 was also around, but we didn’t get to see him.

Ithacan Ranked as Gold Medalist

The Ithacan has been named a gold medalist for the fall 2007 and spring 2008 semesters in the Columbia Scholastic Press Association’s annual college newspaper critique.
Each year the CSPA evaluates member papers on overall content, news, depth reporting, features, opinion/editorial, sports, arts/entertainment, editing/headline writing and design/graphics on the basis of more than 150 specific criteria.
This year the newspaper’s scores on the critique’s 1,000 point scale were 948 for fall and 948 for spring.
The CSPA consistently ranks The Ithacan as a gold medalist, its highest category.