President-elect Marianne Wolf-Astrauskas (left) presents flowers
to 2009 COA Lana Weiss Brown during the May 16 IWPA Awards
Luncheon.
The most ever in recent history attended the May 16
IWPA Awards Luncheon at the Union League Club of
Chicago, with nearly 130 cheering on student journalists and
the Mate E. Palmer Communications Contest winners, as well
as the Communicator of Achievement.
The elegant banquet room lined with original art in a
historic building only a few years older than IWPA set the tone
for President-Elect Marianne Wolf-Astrauskas’ opening
remarks.
“IWPA has been a part of Chicago since 1885, when
our membership included suffragettes, the first woman on the
staff of Cook County Hospital, writers in all fields as well as
illustrators, musical composers, both professionals and those
who wrote ‘on occasion.’
“Today, our membership includes journalists, freelance
authors, public relations professionals, and association
staff... Our organization also supports those new to the communications
field, the recent college graduate, those who find
themselves adjusting to our country’s current economic situation
with a mid-life career change, and some taking pen to
paper for the first time.”
She then announced that the National Federation of
Press Women had chosen IWPA to be the host affi liate for the
August 2010 national conference, where IWPA will celebrate
its 125th anniversary in that same room.
The keynote speaker, Illinois Supreme Court Justice
Anne M. Burke, has also been part of history as one of the
founders of the Special Olympics event that began in Chicago
in 1968 and is now an international sporting competition for
those with intellectual disabilities. In her address, she inspired
those who are making career changes later in life with her story
of graduating from law school at age 40, while juggling a busy
life with four children and a “large dog.”
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She challenged the decision that as a new lawyer she was not accepted into a
young women’s lawyers group on the basis of age and the
decision was overruled. She congratulated award winners and
said to use their gifts, that “artists and writers have the power
to change the world.”
Twenty out of 69 high school journalists who won
awards in the High School Communications Contest were
present to receive accolades from members, parents and
advisors, presented by Mary Ellen Kearns, Student
Contest Chair. Stevenson High School in Lincolnshire won the
coveted Silver Pen Award for achieving the highest number of
points. Fourteen first place winners went on for national judging
and an amazing number – nine – placed nationally. IWPA
provided a small travel stipend for those who planned to make
the trip to the NFPW Conference in San Antonio to receive
their awards in person.
Ann Heinrichs, Mate E. Palmer Contest Chair, acknowledged
in her opening remarks the melt-down in the journalism
world and other industries in which our 36 award winners
work.
“And yet,” she said, “here you all are, your skills very
much alive, the self-destruct button nowhere in sight, finding
ever more imaginative ways to make a living with the written
word. I look at today as a celebration of your spirit of
survival!”
Suzanne Hanney, the out-going president who was in
Europe at an international conference for street newspapers on
the day of the ceremony, took the top award, the distinguished
Silver Feather Award for the most points with her work on StreetWise.
Of the 35 first place entries sent on to the NFPW
contest, 21 have won at the national level, “an awesome showing
of talent right here among us,” said Heinrichs in a later announcement.
Capping off with an amazing show of talent was the
Communicator of Achievement, Lana Brown, who was
selected to represent IWPA in the NFPW competition in San
Antonio in September. Her career began as a child performer
and ventriloquist and she honors her father, who was in radio,
and a selfless mother with this award. Now an award winning
educator, speaker and writer, her vast array of distinguished
accomplishments made her a strong candidate for the national
award.
She draws an analogy of a concrete sidewalk,
where “all of a sudden you see a sparkle,” the mica that
illuminates. She calls IWPA one of the pieces of mica she has
discovered for its “verve and soul.” |
