Ten journalism students competed in the IHSA Journalism Sectional Competition. Eight of the students placed in the Sectional helping North earn fifth place overall. Three students advanced to State.

On the day of Sectionals, multiple participants from different schools competed against each other. Most events lasted an hour and a half. Carolina Lozano, whose event was Infographics, looked at example prompts to help make it. Her topic was senior trips. She wanted “very bright summery colors, considering the fact they seem to be spring slash summer trips,” she said.

On the day of Sectionals, Lozano had to manage how she was going to make the infographic while not in school.

“There were internet issues, but it was mainly just stress and a lot of being overwhelmed, but at the end of the day, I did what I could do, and I’m very proud of how I did,” Lozano said.
She pushed through it and placed first in Sectionals.

Varun Gullapalli took fourth in State for Headline Writing and fifth in State for Newswriting. At Sectionals, Varun came in first for Newswriting and second for Headline Writing. For Newswriting, he used interviews and background information for his prompt, which was a new proposal to build a school and remodel the district structures.

“It just really conveys the facts and the information that the people have to know,” Gullapalli said.
For Headline Writing, Gullapalli was given six stories, and he had to create headlines for them.

“Since the characters for the headlines were small, it was a bit of a struggle, but I had to improvise and be creative,” Gullapalli said.

Natalie Smith, who got fourth and fifth place in Sectionals, did Feature Writing and Advertising.
For Feature Writing, she got a prompt to write about a former student at Abraham High School who was a TV broadcaster for the Chicago Bulls.

“They gave me a video of him talking and being interviewed by Metro, so you would have to put a story around him about what his job is,” Smith said.

Adding to it, her prompts for advertising were how gyms would have a membership for high school students and guitar lessons from Guitar Hero.

“With experience, I don’t have much when it comes to advertising, but it was to have fun trying to make an advertisement,” Smith said.

Senior Maria Clark came in first for Yearbook Caption Writing at Sectionals and sixth for Yearbook Caption Writing at State.

“I was suprised,” Clark said. “When I knew I placed, I was really excited.”