The Occidental received seven awards, including Best Newspaper, from the California College Media Association (CCMA) recognizing excellence in collegiate journalism in the Fall 2021 semester. The Occidental competed in the category of colleges in California with enrollments under 15,000 students and the CCMA announced the awards during the Associated College Press’s (ACP) Spring National College Media Conference March 3–5 at the Hyatt Regency Long Beach. The awards recognized staff members of The Occidental — including writers, media staff and section editors — for their work during the Fall 2021 semester.
“Coming back in person after one and a half years working remotely, we knew that the fall semester would be a rebuilding semester, but I think that we were all surprised by just how much we all learned and by the different ways we had to pull together to get each and every issue,” River Lisius (senior), Fall 2021 editor-in-chief, said. “That understanding makes the award all the more impressive and I’m incredibly proud of our entire staff’s dedication to our work and to each other.”
The Occidental won the following awards:
First place
Best Newspaper: The Occidental’s Nov. 17 print issue, staff award
Best Feature: Divya Prakash (junior) for “Light at the end of the subway tunnel: LA Metro adapts to pandemic and reopening”
Best News Photograph: Grace Meadows (first year) for “OSAC ‘We Demand More’ demonstration and teach-in address sexual assault on campus”
Second place
Best Arts and Entertainment Story: Emma Cho (first year) for “Oxy Arts’ new exhibition ‘Encoding Futures’ presents interactive art as a call to action”
Best Sports Story: Sophia Thé (junior) for “Fifth-year and gap-year student-athletes put graduation on hold for one more season”
Best Photo Series: Leo Blain (junior) for “Diving into Occidental’s water usage”
Third place
Best Breaking News Story: Gwen Berghof (junior), Angela Guglielmino (junior), River Lisius (senior) and Dominic Massimino ’21 for “Suspected incapacitated driver drove onto AGC steps, arrested by LAPD”
Lisius served as editor-in-chief, Meghan Lee (junior) served as managing editor and Charlie Finnerty (senior) served as senior editor in the Fall 2021 semester. Barbara Thomas has served as The Occidental’s staff advisor since 2016.
