Bailley Simms selected as 2018-19 Editor-in-Chief
The VanCougar is proud to announce Bailley Simms as the 2018-2019 Editor-in-Chief. Simms started her work at the paper in Fall 2017 as a reporter. This spring she has worked as a team editor training new reporters and editing stories. Simms has said she wants to expand digital and online content for the publication and put a renewed effort into fully utilizing the magazine-style format of the print publication. To view some of Simms’ stories, go here http://thevancougar.com/author/bailley-simms/.
The VanCougar wins national award
The VanCougar won 7th Place Best in Show award at a national competition hosted by the Associated Collegiate Press. The publication was entered in the category of “four-year schools publishing a less-than-weekly newspaper” to a student body of 10,000 people or less.
The competition took place at the annual Associated Collegiate Press Midwinter National College Journalism Convention in Long Beach, California from March 1-3.
Four members of The VanCougar’s editorial staff in addition to The VanCougar’s advisor attended the conference. The event featured more than 150 workshops teaching journalism skills over the three days. The VanCougar’s staff who attended the event look forward to implementing the skills and knowledge they learned to further improve the publication in the coming months and into the 2018-2019 school year.
Washington State adopts additional free speech protections
On March 21, Washington Governor Jay Inslee signed a new bill into law that will provide additional free speech protections for student journalists.
A number of other states have passed or proposed similar laws in response to the 1988 Supreme Court ruling in Hazelwood School District v. Kuhlmier which gave schools authority to restrict certain student journalist speech.
The new law applies to student journalists, forbidding school administrators from censoring student media content except in certain cases like defamation, libel, or content that incites breaking school rules or bullying students. The bill also affords additional protections for student media advisors—providing protections against retaliation from administrators when advisors refuse to restrict student speech.
The VanCougar’s reporter, Alex Duffield, was one of the first to announce the passage of the new law in a Twitter post after a phone call with the governor’s office, hours after the governor signed.
According to the Student Press Law center, versions of the “New Voices” bill have been introduced in the Washington State Legislature without success for more than 11 years. This version enjoyed largely bipartisan support. The bill passed the State House of Representatives 91-6 and the State Senate 45-4.
To view the bill in its entirety, visit.