BluePrint earns 9th consecutive SNO award
The BluePrint has claimed the title of “distinguished site” for the 9th straight year.
The BluePrint was awarded with its 9th straight SNO distinguished site award on Thursday.
Since the establishment of the site in 2014, the Blueprint has received this SNO honors every year thanks to the hard work of the staff and advisor, Mr. Kerry Naylor.
SNO, Student News Online, is a student news organization that provides a platform for web-based student news.
The SNO Distinguished Sites recognition program was developed to outline the standards of excellence in online school websites to help news staffs excel online.
For the BluePrint to achieve the 2022-2023 SNO honors, the site must fulfill 6 requirements : continuous coverage, site excellence, story page excellence, excellence in writing, multimedia excellence, and audience engagement.
Mr. Naylor, BluePrint advisor, believes this award is one of the more difficult challenges the site faces every year.
“It not only asks the site to maintain a level of excellence but forces us to keep up with technology and new features offered by SNO,” says Mr. Naylor.
The Blueprint was one of only 4 sites in Pennsylvania to win this award, with SNO publications all across the country submitting their sites for this award, “which shows how much of a challenge the award is”, adds Mr. Naylor.
The winning 2022-2023 BluePrint staff writers include: Jacob Hawn, Caleb Beiswenger, Bailee Conway, Tighe Eaken, Brandon Buss, Olivia Hess, Jase Hostler, Jayden Bartlebaugh, Jake Mercer, Payton Martin, and Collin Matthews.
As well as the Distinguished Site Award, BluePrint staff writers have been recognized continuously this year for their standout writing and stories.
Olivia Hess, Tighe Eaken, and Jacob Hawn, earned individual SNO honors for their stories during the 2022-2023 school year while also contributing to the Distinguished Site Award.
The BluePrint itself was recognized as the No. 2 student news website in PA at the Keystone Media awards, while Hawn and Conway each had stories recognized as the best in their categories in several different statewide awards contests. Hess was a regional winner at the PSPA journalism contest in November and placed third at the PSPA’s state contest in what was a successful year for BluePrint writers.
