The Arkansas Scholastic Press Association (ASPA) holds a convention every year and schools from all over the state attend this event. The students left April 13 and came back to Searcy April 15.


“This is an annual event for yearbook, newspaper, broadcast, literary magazines with contest and sessions,” said journalism and TV  teacher Jacalyn Romey.


Many students from Searcy High yearbook, journalism, and TV broadcasting classes went to the convention in Rogers, Ark.


“ASPA is a gathering of student journalist from all over the state of Arkansas where you can compete in events, listen to speakers, and win awards for your school,” said sophomore and InFocus anchor, Nick Craven.



During the convention, there are plenty of things to keep students busy, including many competitions for students to enter that were based on what classes they were in.


“I entered the outside contest for editorials,” said sophomore, and journalism student Ross Parish.



Many of the students that entered from Searcy High School won awards.


“Lexie Jansa and I won first place in stand up,” Craven said. “We were given the beginning and ending of a news story with a hole in the middle, it was our job to insert a transition to connect the two halves of the story.”

“I won two, one for superior in newspaper personality profile for my story on Mr. Dillard and the other one for my review on Grand Theft Auto,” said Parish.


Not only did individual students win awards, but classes did as well.


“Broadcast and online took all Arkansas. This is like the winning state championships, we also made the Hall of Fame for online newspaper. There were numerous other awards too,”said  Romey. “Dylan Rohr won runner-up broadcast journalist and our Yearbook editor won editor of the year.”


The convention also had many different workshops for whatever students were interested.


“I was a part of the only broadcast workshop where we got to meet people from the NBC news station in Rogers, Arkansas. ” said Craven. “They told us all about their jobs and what to expect if we choose to try for a similar job,”


At the end of the ASPA convention, they held a dance for all of the attendees.

“The dance was in a meeting room with strobe lights, a DJ at the front, and a big dance floor in the middle, other than when a mother tried to turn on all the lights, it was pretty cool,” said Craven.



Each student had something different that they enjoyed most about the trip.


“My favorite part of the ASPA trip was the dance we had on the second night,” said Craven.


The students seemed to have a great time attending ASPA.


“ASPA was a great experience. I have learned quite a few things from the workshops held there, I also enjoyed the social aspect of it all,” said Parish.


The trip was a great learning and memorable experience for the attendees of Searcy High.