Appleton North Noctiluca staff won a total of 31 awards, including a top prize blue ribbon in its publication division, at the NEWSPA journalism spring conference on Wednesday, April 26 at UW-Oshkosh.

The Northeastern Scholastic Press Association, in partnership with the University of Wisconsin-Oshkosh’s Department of Journalism, organizes the annual event that attracts nearly 500 scholastic journalists each year. The spring conference, hosted at UW-Oshkosh, gives students the opportunity to learn from professionals in the field of journalism and allows for high schools from around the region to collaborate. NEWSPA has been around since 1969.

The conference welcomes a range of publications, from traditional print newspapers and yearbooks, to magazines, to websites, all from schools throughout Wisconsin.

NEWSPA Executive Secretary Barb Benish, who has been participating in the conference for about 40 years, first attending as a high school student in 1977, knows the passion that students have for their publications.

“I hope they get excited for their publications and go back to their schools with ideas on how they can improve,” Benish said.

This year, 25 schools and over 400 students and advisers attended this year’s conference, a significant growth compared to past conferences, she said.

“Don’t listen to the naysayers that journalism is dead; just changed,” Benish said. “Today more than ever, there is a need for reputable journalists to go after the truth.”