Greetings everyone,

I hope you enjoyed the first weekend of the NCAA Tournaments and your brackets aren’t completely busted. (Mine are, it’s fine to admit it!)

First, congratulations to Red Smith Award winner Thomas Boswell of The Washington Post. I hope you’re as excited to hear him speak in Minnesota as I am. 

And now that the Major League Baseball season has joined the fray, the sports calendar is quite full. And so is the lineup for APSE as we turn to April.

Here are some updates and reminders on big items coming up, and some notes on other things we’ve previously talked about.

dan

The Big Things

Next in Line for Second VP

Second Vice President voting will open Monday, March 31, and run through April 20. The winner of this election will join the officers team at the end of June and be the president of APSE for the 2027-28 cycle. An email with candidates and their biographies will be sent to all members and posted to the website. One vote per member organization.

Summer Conference 2025

SUMMER CONFERENCE REGISTRATION IS NOW OPEN. 

The link for conference registration (and a second link for hotel reservations) have been posted on the website. $169 per night for rooms in our block; rate runs through June 2. Again, the conference is from June 26-28 in Minneapolis.

While we are still finalizing the lineup of panelists and scope of our sessions, here are the subjects that will be discussed.

• Asserting our experience to tell the stories in a new world of collegiate sports
• Becoming the dynamic leaders needed for dynamic reporters
• Capitalizing on the explosion of women’s sports
• Data Reporting: How to do it, and present it
• Increasing awareness, accuracy and understanding on LGBTQ+ sports reporting
• Keeping momentum in the evolution of high school sports reporting
• Learning how award winners produced the 2024 APSE Contest’s best work
• Monetizing successful event coverage
• Winning through remote reporting

We’ll also again have our career development session, led by former APSE President Lisa Wilson. If you are a young professional or student that wants their work critiqued, please begin getting that information together. If you would like to critique and provide feedback to those young professionals and students – Lisa will be collecting information for both.

Finally, we are looking at outing options for those that come to town Wednesday, including Twins baseball and Minnesota United MLS games.

Make Sure You’re Signed Up

APSE committee growth through volunteers: As mentioned at the winter conference, we’re aiming to grow our corps of help for our committees, especially for membership and career advancement. If you are not already a committee chair or a regional leader, please take a few minutes to think about where you can help APSE from time to time. Click here for the form. 

Donn Walden Grant: Donn Walden was the former sports editor at The Lewiston Tribune in Idaho and was the vice chair of the West Region of APSE at the time of his unexpected death early in 2023. Donn was a fierce advocate for APSE and what it can do for sports editors from small newspapers and cities. In his honor, APSE has created an annual $1,000 grant for a small-newsroom editor to attend our annual summer conference. Please fill out this form by April 14 to be considered for the award. APSE officers will review all submissions and choose a recipient. 

BJK Award deadline is Monday: You’ve got less than a week to enter the second annual Billie Jean King Award for Excellence in Women’s Sports Coverage. A reminder that this a four-story portfolio entry from work completed in 2024 and can fall into one of four categories: Professional, college and high school sports, as well as an at-large category that can encompass a combination of those previous sports, commentary, or coverage of amateur athletics. The deadline is the end of the day, Monday, March 31.

• Also, do you want to be a judge for this year’s Billie Jean King contest? Please let Paul know at apsecontest@gmail.com.

Commissioners Meetings: Set for April 28-29 in New York City. It’s a full lineup over those two days – which starts at 8:30 a.m. Monday, so plan your travel accordingly. Leaders of the NCAA and NASCAR, as well as professional basketball, baseball, hockey and soccer organizations are all currently slated to appear. Full information was emailed to members this week; please let Hank Winnicki know if you can attend (hank.winnicki@newsday.com or 631-885-0223).

Region Meetings

Northeast Meeting is scheduled for April 14 in Philadelphia at Temple University. A full list of the schedule, location and parking information is on the website. Contact Northeast Region chair Jim Pignatiello at jpignati@masslive.com with questions or confirm your attendance.

West Meeting is scheduled for April 16 and will be a virtual session that afternoon (2 p.m. Mountain time). West Region chair Chris Boan and vice chair Maria McIlwain are finalizing the details. Please email Chris at cgboan@gmail.com to get on the list for that Zoom information once it’s available.

Midwest Meeting is looking like Friday, April 25, in Cincinnati at the Reds Hall of Fame. Midwest chair Jason Hoffman and vice chair Aaron Ferguson are finalizing details. Email Jason at jhoffman@cincinna.gannett.com if you plan to attend and could help speak on a panel.

Southeast Meeting will be May 12 at the Alabama Sports Hall of Fame in Birmingham. More details to come soon from region chair John Devine and Tommy Deas.

A reminder that any member can attend any region meeting they choose, even if it’s not their “home” region.

Other Items of Note

TIDES: If you have yet to fill out the TIDES report’s new survey for information on the diversity of our members’ staffs, please do that at this link from UCF. A reminder that your information is not individually shared; all data is used to help us see how we are growing in diverse teams to help us be better for our readers.

Naila-Jean Meyers Award announcement: The Minnesota Star Tribune will announce the winner of the Naila-Jean Meyers Grant in early April, ahead of this summer’s conference.

Scholarships: Information is out on the four scholarships we’ll be awarding this year; two again will be given to students at Historically Black Colleges and Universities. For more details, check out this post. Deadline is May 25. 

2024 Contest Results: Paul Barrett will begin rolling out the annual set of stories on winners of every category for this year’s contest. Keep an eye on the website through early April for that information. Congrats again to everyone who made the finals. It’s a terrific achievement.