Skyline Post writers won state-level awards for five articles in the Michigan Interscholastic Press Association (MIPA) Individuals Category Contest on April 25. Winners are published in its magazine A Cut Above over the summer. Members of the Skyline Post compete with other like-sized schools in division two, which had 428 entrants in the categories below.

Micheal Mychaliska (‘23) won first place for environmental/health/science reporting for an article on the geothermal leak at Skyline.

Mychaliska and Lucas Caswell (‘24) co-won first place in a broad news category for their article on a First Amendment civil suit against Skyline. 

Maya Loomis (‘23) earned an honorable mention in news analysis for an article on Skyline’s parking pass price increase.

Caswell earned an honorable mention in in depth news for an article on Ann Arbor’s ARPA funding distribution plan.

Caswell, Nathaniel Werns (‘24), Will Pace (‘24), Ryan Rzeszut (‘23), and Graham Unsworth (‘23) earned an honorable mention in sports news for their collective article on 2022 fall sports at Skyline.

“I honestly did not expect to win,” said Caswell. “There are so many great writers out there. It wouldn’t be possible without my fabulous colleagues and an amazing advisor.” 

Cooperation and teamwork is a central pillar at The Post, with journalists collaborating at every step of the process.

“It felt really good to know that I was a help in this community and did something to aid them in winning a state award,” said Bella Simonte (‘23), Editor-at-Large. 

“It’s awesome to be recognized for something that I was a part of. Since it was so many people I’m glad we all got the recognition; we all worked so hard on that,” said Pace. He also emphasized the importance of editing in the article process: you “edit [your article] a million times. Because it’s never right the first or the second or the third or the fourth, and so on, you need to keep going at it. Because it’s never going to be perfect but you can get as close to perfect if you stay editing always.”

MIPA has existed since 1921, running various contests during that time. The Individuals Category Contest has been running since at least 1993.  Further information can be found here. 

“The main mission of our contest is to promote high quality journalism in schools across the state,” said Jeremy Steele, Executive Director of MIPA. “Increasingly, [school newspapers] are becoming main sources of information in their communities. … they’re taking an important role in our communities and our civil society.” 

“It’s wonderful to see a new program really trying to take journalism seriously and improve,” continued Steele. “Really, it’s about constantly trying to improve your work.”

“I’m very proud of this team,” said Annie Blais, journalism teacher at Skyline. “They worked hard together to find important local stories that matter to our community – stories that other local news outlets are not always covering. They asked the hard questions, developed strong sources, and crafted high quality writing together through countless rounds of feedback, editing, and re-drafting. I really couldn’t be more proud of what these young people have already achieved, since our founding two years ago.”