UNC Asheville Students Win 13 College Media Awards in Statewide Competition
UNC Asheville’s student news outlet The Blue Banner and literary journal Headwaters won 13 awards at the annual North Carolina College Media Association’s (NCCMA) conference held February 28 at Elon University.
The conference featured breakout sessions and awards presentations. Each year the NCCMA co-hosts the conference with different college campuses in the state. In total, 19 colleges and universities from across North Carolina attended the conference.
The Blue Banner received the following awards for the 2025 calendar year:
- First place for Cartoon: Elliot Myrus, “Getting Ghosted”
- Second place for News Writing: Chrisoula Theodorou, “Voices Unheard: The Unspoken Stories of Indigenous Women.”
- Third place for News Writing: Adam Hetland, “Students and community unite to Wrap the Woods.”
- Third place for Sports Writing: Sage Branch, “ UNC Asheville student combines athletics and atmospheric science through a new weather program.”
- Third Place for Opinion Writing: Kellan (Ashton) Harrison “How free are we? Commentary on our right to free speech.”
- Third Place for Digital Storytelling: Mavie Marcos, “A nod and a glance: Tango etiquette in Asheville.”
- Honorable mention in Sports Writing: Isabel Richardson, “For the strength of the Bulldog is the pack.”
- Honorable mention in Feature Writing: “Life in the ring: family comedy and UNC Asheville.”
- Honorable mention in Opinion Writing: Alexandrea Thompson, “Lessons from a Saturn.”
- Honorable mention in Digital Storytelling: “Palestine protest with the BBC.”
- A Best of Show in Online News: The Blue Banner
- A Best of Show in Newspapers (small): The Blue Banner
Headwaters received the following awards for 2025:
- Honorable mention in Nonfiction: Clementine Hyatt, “Hands of Mine.”
About UNC Asheville
Founded in 1927, UNC Asheville is a proud member of the University of North Carolina System. With award-winning faculty, small class sizes, and 60+ academic programs in the natural sciences, human sciences, humanities, arts, and social sciences, the University is recognized for its robust paid internship programs to prepare students to immediately enter the workforce. In the US News & World Report 2025 edition of Best Colleges, UNC Asheville is ranked No. #9 in Top Public Schools, and No. #7 in Princeton Review’s 2025 Top 50 Guide to Green Colleges. Known as the Bulldogs, UNC Asheville student-athletes compete in 16 NCAA Division I Teams in the Big South Conference. For more information, please visit: www.unca.edu.
About the North Carolina College Media Association
The NCCMA, sponsored by the UNC School of Journalism and Mass Communication at UNC-Chapel Hill, offers a one-day conference on a different campus each year to hold educational workshops and recognize outstanding work from the state’s student newspapers, yearbooks, and online news organizations.
For more information, contact the Blue Banner’s faculty adviser and Senior Lecturer of Mass Communication, Michael Gouge, at 828.232.2423 or mgouge@unca.edu.
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