The Corsair & Caylo Seals Win at ACP Clips & Clicks

SMC’s The Corsair Ranks Seventh in Nationwide Annual ACP Sweepstakes Awards

Associated Collegiate Press Also Awards First Place for Feature Photo to Corsair Staffer Caylo Seals; Sweepstakes Recognizes Publications with the Highest Numbers of Winners

SANTA MONICA, CA—Santa Monica College’s (SMC) student-run media outlet The Corsair has ranked seventh in the nationwide annual Sweepstakes Clips & Clicks Awards organized by the Associated Collegiate Press (ACP), a competition that recognizes work produced by student journalists and photojournalists in the prior academic year. The Battalion from Texas Tech University ranked first, with the most winners in each category of the contest. SMC student/Corsair staffer Caylo Seals also won first place in the Spring 2024 ACP Clips & Clicks feature photo category.

The ACP wins come on the heels of the Society of Professional Journalists Los Angeles (SPJ/LA) naming outgoing Corsair editor-in-chief Cebelihle Hlatshwayo as one of its honorees in the emerging/outstanding students category (Hlatshwayo and the other honorees will be recognized at SPJ/LA’s 48th Distinguished Journalist Awards Banquet on Oct. 23).

A total of 50 ACP-member student media outlets—from both two-year and four-year institutions—placed in the Clips & Clicks contest during the 2023-24 school year. There were 412 submissions in the spring competition; approximately 20 percent—or 85 entries—were recognized. Judges were collegiate professors, student media advisers and professional journalists.

“The judges consistently said they were very impressed with the quality of the entries submitted,” ACP associate director Gary Lundgren said. The number of winners in each category was determined by the judges based on the quantity and quality of the entries. The Sweepstakes rankings are awarded based on a points system that takes into account how many first-place, second-place awards, and so on a media outlet and its individual staffers win in various categories.

Of his first place award-winning feature photo—taken during the second half of El Clasico Tapatio 2024 at BMO Stadium in Los Angeles, Calif. on March 24, 2024—Caylo Seals said: “The game was crazy . . . it started off with heavy rain for the first 30 or so minutes, then the light came out with this golden glow making for some great photos. Towards the end, fans from both sides started lighting fireworks, smoke bombs, and flares. It was full of dynamic photo opportunities!”

The Corsair advising team includes journalism instructor Sharyn Obsatz , photojournalism instructor Gerard Burkhart, and social media journalism instructor Samantha Nuñez. The Corsair staff produces a newspaper in the spring and fall semesters, currently available on https://issuu.com/corsair.website, and publishes news content online at thecorsaironline.com. Follow The Corsair on Instagram @corsairnews.
 
Santa Monica College’s journalism program offers career training in reporting and nonfiction storytelling across multiple platforms: print, photography, video, audio, social media, and digital media production. Students are prepared for roles including reporter, correspondent, editor, copywriter, audience engagement editor, social media content creator and broadcast producer. There are still spots available in the following courses for the Fall 2024 semester which begins Aug. 26: Journalism 16: Producing the Campus Newspaper; Journalism 22/Photo 14: Photography for Publication; Journalism 7/Media 25: Engaging Audiences for Journalism and Social Media; and Journalism 4A/Media 14: Newscasting and Newswriting. More information is available at smc.edu/journalism.

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Santa Monica College is a California Community College accredited by the Acccrediting Commission for Community and Junior Colleges (ACCJC). The Associated Collegiate Press is the largest and oldest national membership organization for college student media in the U.S. ACP provides journalism education services to students, teachers, media advisers and others throughout the United States and in other countries. A division of National Scholastic Press Association, founded in 1921, ACP has more than 570 members. Learn more at studentpress.org/acp.