BLOOMINGTON, IL - IWU’s student newspaper, The Argus, returned from the annual Illinois College Press Association (ICPA) conference last month with a suite of awards in its division, including 1st place in General Excellence, Print, first place in the Sweepstakes for the most awards overall, and 1st place awards in multiple sub-categories, competing against institutions with fewer than 2,300 students.
The ICPA award ceremony, held annually in Chicago, highlight the hard work of student journalists across Illinois, recognizing their efforts in reporting, editing and newspaper production. Illinois Wesleyan was represented at the conference by co-editors in chief Cody Buskohl and Brooke Pachetti and features editor Audrey Peterson.
Buskohl received 1st place honors for Sports Page Design and News Story, as well as an honorable mention for Feature Story. Peterson was honored with 1st place in Sports Photo, 2nd place in Sports Game Story and an honorable mention in Sports Game Story.
“I take photos at every sporting event I can make it to and usually end up writing the story to go with whatever photo we publish, so there's been a lot of opportunities for me to practice,” Peterson said. “I've also had the pleasure of joining the athletic communications office here at IWU as a photographer, and their staff has been so supportive of me while I work on improving my photography.”
According to R. Forrest Colwell Endowed Chair Professor of English, and faculty advisor for The Argus, James Plath, producing a weekly campus newspaper requires a significant commitment from students. He emphasized that the process involves extensive hours of reporting, writing, editing and design to meet strict publication deadlines.
“Putting out a campus newspaper is a gargantuan task that requires long hours and plenty of hard work just to meet the publishing deadline every week,” Plath said.
Plath noted that the success of the student staff over the past three years has come from their willingness to go beyond simply producing a paper each week. Instead, he said, the students have focused on developing stories that actively engage readers and require deeper reporting efforts.
“When a staff excels like they have for the past three years, it's because they have committed themselves to not just filling space and putting an issue to bed, but also to doing the extra work needed to create a paper that invites reading and includes plenty of so-called ‘enterprise reporting’—stories they have to go out and find on their own,” Plath said.
Peterson said that, through all his different jobs at The Argus, Professor Plath has been supportive. “He pushes me and all of our writers because he cares, and that’s what gets results at ICPA every year."
Peterson said Plath’s critiques can be “pretty relentless,” but “it’s because he knows we have potential,” she said.
The Argus staff received a General Excellence award for the second year in a row. “[It] was definitely a confidence booster for all of us,” Peterson said. “It feels great, both for me and the whole staff. We've had a lot of ups and downs with a really small staff this year, and still being able to walk away with that recognition just goes to show how much work we all put in.”
2025 ICPA Winners (MJ Soria, Cody Buskohl, Brooke Pachetti, editors-in-chief)
1st—Sweepstakes (most awards, weighted)
1st—General Excellence, Print (Argus Staff)
1st—Column (Lola Zuro)
1st—Sports Column (Kaylee Unruh)
1st—Sports Page Design (Cody Buskohl)
1st—Photo Essay (Argus Staff)
1st—Sports Photo (Audrey Peterson)
1st—News Story (Cody Buskohl)
2nd—Graphic Illustration (Naomi Toraason)
2nd—Sports Game Story (Audrey Peterson)
3rd—Front Page Design (Argus Staff)
HM—Editorial Cartoon (Naomi Toraason)
HM—Opinion Pages (Argus Staff)
HM—Feature Story (Cody Buskohl)
HM—Sports Game Story (Audrey Peterson)
HM—Sports Column (Kaylee Unruh)