UHCL's student publications wins TIPA awards

Four of The Signal staff pictured with their award-winning editorial magazine "The Spectacle." This magazine is one of many communication efforts that displays their creative abilities. From left Editor-in-chief: Cesar Cardenas, Severin Gawlik, Frank Borrego, and Karsyn Coxie.

University of Houston- Clear Lake’s student publication, The Signal, brought home 15 total awards at the annual Texas Intercollegiate Press Association Conference spring 2023. Cesar Cardenas, editor-in-chief of The Signal, said the staff is very passionate about their work. He explains how they achieved this success.

“Universities who are members of TIPA submit their best pieces of work that get judged by members of the TIPA board. They have hundreds of categories; not everyone qualifies for all of the categories,” Cardenas said. “We look at the categories and submit our best work to be judged for that category.”

Categories for the contest included electronic, narrative,  and visual reporting, production, and overall excellence.

The Signal placed first, second, third, and honorable mention this year in multiple categories such as editorial writing, headline writing, and literary writing, graphic design, blogging, reporting, podcast, and photography.

Despite having many other competitors throughout Texas, Cardenas said bigger doesn’t always mean better.

“These are our awards and we are still a fairly small university, but we’re proven to be better than some of the bigger ones. The community we foster helps us stand out,” Cardenas explained.

Cardenas said it’s a good feeling to win these awards and the staff takes pride in everything they do. He hopes these awards will help people fully understand what The Signal is, and what it represents.

“It’s a very interesting experience. Once you get that list with your name on it in an email, it’s a great feeling to have and makes our work worth doing,” he explained. “I don’t think people truly understand who we are. When they think newspaper, they usually think the new door by the cafeteria or this new program going on and we do a lot more than that. Anything someone wants to do creatively, there is a space for them here.”

For more information about The Signal and how to join visit, www.uhcl.edu/student-affairs/campus-community/student-publications/.