IC News

Ithaca College’s student media organizations were honored with several prestigious awards for their work during the 2019-2020 academic year.

This past October, The Ithacan was awarded a national Newspaper Pacemaker Award, which is widely considered the Pulitzer Prize of college journalism. And on the broadcast side, the College Media Association named 92-WICB the Pinnacle Award Winner for Four-Year Radio Station of the Year.

In addition to continuing to provide top-tier coverage of the college and local community under the leadership of editor-in-chief Sophia Adamucci ’20, The Ithacan underwent a significant redesign, including different fonts and the use of more color to give the paper a fresher look.

Adamucci credits the professional and helpful environment of the newsroom with contributing to the paper’s success, stating that the staff could rely on one another throughout a challenging year. She added that, although she felt dejected when the semester on campus was cut short, taking home the Pacemaker helped to create closure. 

“Winning reminded me of all the hard work we put in and how committed we were,” Adamucci said. “To win the award was just extra. It just goes to show a job well done.” 

In 2017, The Ithacan was inducted into the Associated College Press Pacemaker Hall of Fame in recognition of its numerous Pacemaker finalist nominations and wins. It had previously taken home the award seven times, most recently in 2015, and been named a finalist 10 more times. In addition, the paper has won the Online Pacemaker eight times, most recently in 2019.

Madison Fernandez ’21, who served as the paper’s news editor during the past year, said that while she was grateful for the recognition, awards aren’t the motivation behind the production of the paper. 

“We don't do this to win awards. We do it because we're trying to share information with the college community,” she said.

A similar sentiment was shared by Peter Champelli ’20, who served as WICB’s station manager during the 2019-20 academic year. Champelli stressed that he wanted to make the strengths of the station stand out even more, while being a source for the college’s community.

“WICB really cares about their listeners,” he said.

Champelli said the award also caused him to reflect back on his time at the station. “It reinforced how grateful I was to have been a part of WICB,” he said. “It was the best decision I made at IC.”

Manager of television and radio operations Jeremy Menard was particularly proud that ICB’s award recognized everything the station does.

“This is truly an organization award,” he said. “The best feeling of all was when I sent out an email to the entire student staff saying congratulations.”

Menard was also grateful for the support from alumni, members of the college’s senior leadership team such as president Shirley M. Collado, and administrators in the Roy H. Park School of Communications.