Questions about registration, payment or substitutions?

The University of Kansas and KSPA’s office in Stauffer-Flint Hall are operating with modified and unpredictable hours due to the pandemic. Our staff is working remotely, except for occasional visits to campus. However, please continue mailing any checks to our mailing address below:

• KSPA, 1435 Jayhawk Boulevard, Lawrence KS 66045

And you can reach executive director Eric Thomas and administrative assistant Kerry Navinskey by phone at (785) 864-0605 or via email at staff@kspaonline.org.

For the 2019 Regional Contest, KSPA researched how to improve our the Regional contests for you. That year, we introduced a way to make the Regional Contests both more fair and more convenient. And it was a huge success! We know the changes encouraged long-time members to keep competing. And of course, we loved seeing new schools join the fun.

     The KSPA staff will create Regionals with a more balanced number of schools in each Regional Grouping. Rather than guessing at how many schools will attend a regional, KSPA will make regional groupings after we know how many schools are competing.

     Advisers simply complete registration by Jan. 17. Using those registrations, KSPA will create regional groupings based on the number of schools that register. For about every seven schools, KSPA will create a regional. So, in 2019, 43 schools competed in 5A/6A Regionals. That created 6 regionals.

     We will be sure to publish regional groupings soon after that initial registration deadline. Plus, our digital submission system will automatically slot entries from your school into the correct regional grouping.

     Nearby schools will likely be in the same regional. However, we will avoid — as much as possible — clustering high schools from the same school district into the same regional. For instance, schools in the AnyTown School District might be distributed into a few different regional groupings, even though they are geographically close to one another.

This sheet is not a required step in the registration process, but should help advisers in gathering — whether on paper or digitally — the information needed to organize for the KSPA Regional contests. Advisers do not need to communicate the names and email addresses of their students upon registration. Students will provide their names upon submission of their entry. Gathering email addresses will be helpful if advisers want to add students as authorized entrants to the digital submission contest system at BetterBNC.com.

• Planning Sheet as a PDF
• Planning Sheet as an Excel Document
• Planning Sheet as a Google Doc

Nine Writing Categories, most of them previously called “on-site” contests, will be offered. Prompts will be published at 3 p.m. on Feb. 19 and remain available for submission until 11 p.m. Sunday, Feb. 21. Submission of entries will occur through an online form that will open Feb. 19 at 3 p.m.

• Category W1: Copyediting
• Category W2: Sports Writing
• Category W3: Yearbook Copy
• Category W4: Feature Writing
• Category W5: News Writing
• Category W6: Cutline Writing
• Category W7: Editorial Writing
• Category W8: Yearbook Sports Writing
• Category W9:  Review Writing

Sixteen Visual Categories, previously called “digital submission” contests, will be offered. The prompts for all Visual Categories were published Dec. 3. All entries are due — through submission to the BNC contest system — by 11 p.m. Feb. 21.

• Category V01: A Winter Wonderland, sponsored by KANSAS! magazine (previously, Academics Photography)
• Category V02: Advertising Design
• Category V03: Digital Illustration (previously, Photo Illustration)
• Category V04: Editorial Cartoon (previously, an “on-site” category)
• Category V05: Headline Writing & Design
• Category V06: Infographic Design
• Category V07: Multimedia Storytelling (previously, a “state-only” category)
• Category V08: News Page Design
• Category V09: Social Media (can be a team of up to four, or an entire staff)
• Category V10: Sports Photography
• Category V11: Student Life Photography
• Category V12: Video News (can be a team of up to four)
• Category V13: Video PSA (can be a team of up to four)
• Category V14: Video Sports Promo (can be a team of up to four)
• Category V15: Yearbook Design (previously, “Yearbook Layout”)
• Category V16: Yearbook Theme & Graphics (can be team of up to two)

Entries to Visual Categories are submitted using BetterBNC Media Awards Platform. The system will allow for secure submissions, quick judging and high-quality feedback. This document provides in-depth instructions, including video tutorials.

During a normal State Contest, judges use paper copies of rubrics to provide feedback to students about their writing, cartooning and editing. That will not be possible this year. However, you can reference the rubrics to see the qualities that judges usually seek. Here are rubrics and some comments that judges often make. (Please note that some rubrics are still being developed for newly added categories.)

A particular student may only participate in five total categories, whether individually or as a team.

The fee for each entry is $12.

KSPA understands that statewide school closures mean that finances and contest payments will be unpredictable. During these extraordinary times, KSPA is dedicated to encouraging journalists through contests. Schools will receive their awards and feedback even if payment is pending. We simply ask that you request payment when you and your school district are able.

• Payment may be made online by credit card at the time of registration.
• For payment by check, please make checks payable to “KSPA” and send the check to KSPA, 1435 Jayhawk Blvd., Room 318, Lawrence, KS 66045.

• Cutline Writing: Students will write cutlines for five photos provided. Students may use dictionary, thesaurus and AP Stylebooks. .
• Copyediting Contest: Students will complete two different tasks in this contest (a previous example can be found here). First, students will respond to 25 different multiple choice questions with possible errors in AP style, accuracy, libel, attribution, grammar, spelling and redundancy. Students will respond with the best answer, which could be “no change” to the existing sentence. Students will also read a sample story. In response to the sample story, the student will provide feedback, coaching, notes of caution and encouragement to the writer. Students may use dictionary, thesaurus and AP style manuals.
• Other Writing Contests: (Yearbook copy, yearbook sports, feature, news, sports and editorial writing contests). Students will write a story based on information provided on a fact sheet. Students may write in pen or pencil. Paper will be provided. Students may use dictionary, thesaurus and AP Stylebooks.

Want a preview of what the Writing Category prompts will be like? Want a classroom activity for your students? Need an emergency lesson plan?

KSPA has a page of prompts from previous state and regional contests for you. We will continue to add to the collection as we search through our archives. ONE IMPORTANT NOTE: please notice that some of the rules and formats for the contests have changed (most notably for the Copyediting On-Site Contest). Be sure to read all directions for this year’s contest for guidance.

Check out our “Simply Better” pages, a showcase of the award-winning entries from previous Regional and State competitions. These examples can be used as classroom examples for students who will compete in State.

• 2020 KSPA State Contest
• 2019 KSPA State Contest 
• 2018 KSPA State Contest
• 2018 KSPA Regional Contest
• 2017 KSPA State Contest
• 2016 KSPA State Contest
• 2015 KSPA State Contest
• 2014 KSPA State Contest
  • Largest file size :: (NO PREVIEW available, must download) best for printing and reading clarity, but slower download (115 MB)
  • Smaller file size :: better for fast download, but graphics may not print well (4.1 MB)