Humber Et Cetera clinched two wins in the Ontario Community Newspapers Association’s (OCNA’s) Better Newspaper Competitions (BNC) Awards 2024 on Friday, May 24.
Among the four finalists, Humber College’s Et Cetera won first place in the General Excellency Class 8 category for colleges and universities, surpassing University of Waterloo’s Imprint and Fanshawe College’s Interrobang at third and second places respectively.
The BNC Awards committee applauded Humber Et Cetera’s “clean style.”
“Overall, this paper has a clean and high-contrast style with sections in the expected places. I enjoyed the themes in both editions,” the BNC Award’s judge said.
The two issues that were awarded the win included one from fall 2022 and another from winter 2023.
Humber Et Cetera is the Humber College journalism program newspaper and it is published weekly during fall and winter semesters. Et Cetera has previously also won awards in Columbia Scholastic Press Association’s (CSPA) Collegiate Gold Circle Awards and OCNA Better Newspapers Competitions.
Humber Et Cetera also secured the top place in the Student Feature Writing. There were 18 finalists in the category.
Student journalist Emma Posca’s story about senior citizens who were separated from their spouses due to limited long-term care beds won the award followed by Algonquin College’s Arty Sarkisian and Navraj Sandhar from Durham College.
Posca’s coverage of an important issue was hailed by the BNC Awards committee while also mentioning the “compelling characters” in her story.
“A fantastic job highlighting an important and heartbreaking issue brought to life through compelling characters,” the awards’ judge said.
Posca’s story, published on Dec. 16, 2022, detailed the agony of separated elderly couples due to limitations on beds. She interviewed seniors at Fairview Mennonite Home in Cambridge, Ont. and quoted the most impactful excerpts in her report.
Humber College’s news website, humbernews.ca, also received an honorable mention in the Best College/University Website category.
