Reporters land new jobs, photographers win awards — and some Chipsters just keep on running

Moving up:

Staci Brown Brooks

Staci Brown Brooks (Summer 1998 and 1999) has been promoted to director of interactive content at The Birmingham (Ala.) News. She oversees the paper’s editorial content at al.com. Brooks has been a copy editor, features reporter, assistant features editor and assistant metro editor at the paper.

Moving on:

Michelle Ma (Summer 2006) is a resident producer for seattletimes.com. Previously she was a Metcalf Environmental Reporting Fellow at The Seattle Times.

Sona Patel (Summer 2006) is a social media producer for seattletimes.com. Previously she was a reporter for The Tribune in San Luis Obispo, Calif.

Astrid Galvan

Astrid Galvan (Spring 2008) is a night cops reporter for the Albuquerque (N.M.) Journal. Previously she was a reporter for The Arizona Republic in Phoenix.

Marjon Rostami (Summer 2008) is a reporter for The Virginian-Pilot in Norfolk. Previously she was a reporter for The Arizona Republic in Phoenix.

Diego James Robles (Summer 2008) is a photographer for The Denver Post.

Dalina Castellanos

Dalina Castellanos (Spring 2009) is a staff writer for the Gallup (N.M.) Independent, joining fellow Chipster Karen Francis. Castellanos had freelanced for the paper since December. Her new beats include the eastern Navajo reservation, Zuni, health, education, music and state patrol. She says, “It’s a small town with a small paper, but we cover a lot of ground. I’m very fortunate and proud to be able to join such a hardworking crew and have seen firsthand how the stories in the Independent affect people in and around the reservation.”

Nicole Santa Cruz

Nicole Santa Cruz (Spring 2009) has been hired as a full-time reporter by the Los Angeles Times after a six-month internship at the paper.

Carolyn Chin

Carolyn Chin (Summer 2009) has been hired as a page designer at The Detroit News, her hometown paper. Chin graduates from Wayne State University in May.

Ryan Strong (Summer 2009) will be a summer intern for the Daily News in New York.

Awards:

Jason McKibben (Spring 2005) won second place in the National Press Photographers Association’s Best of Photojournalism, Sports Audio Slideshow/Independent category for “Oh Chute!” http://bop.nppa.org/2010/web_sites/winners/?cat=SAS&place=2nd&smc=INDE. McKibben is a freelance photographer based in Maine.

Devin Wagner

Devin Wagner (Spring 2008) won third place in the Visual Journalism/Division II for Best of Gannett 2009. Wagner won for work he did as a photographer for The Jackson (Tenn.) Sun. His winning entry was for coverage of the culture of cotton farming in West Tennessee, including a package of video stories, photo galleries and print coverage. Wagner is now a photographer for The Argus Leader in Sioux Falls, S.D.

Diego James Robles

Diego James Robles (Summer 2008) was named the White House News Photographers Association’s 2010 Student Photographer of the Year. Robles, a photojournalism graduate of Ohio University, has also received the following awards:

*1st Place Finalist for Hearst Photojournalism Competition: News/Sports
*A1 Centerpiece, The New York Times Student Journalism Institute
*Finalist, Photographers Forum Magazine annual student contest
*Ohio News Photographers Association Student Photographer of the Year (2nd year running)
*Alexia Foundation Award of Excellence with partial scholarship to study in England
*Press Photographers Association of Greater Los Angeles Student Photographer of the Year

Outreach:

Martin Reynolds (Summer 1995), editor of The Oakland Tribune, served as a 2009 Best of Gannett judge.

Other news:

John C. Quinn with Javacia Harris and Ed Bowser, showing their Loie Legacy Award plaques.

Married Chipsters Ed Bowser (Summer 2001) and Javacia Harris (Summer 2002) have relocated to Birmingham, Ala., Harris’ hometown. She is teaching literature at Alabama School of Fine Arts, the high school she attended. The school focuses on careers in the performing arts and math and sciences. Ed is an editor for Luckie & Company, an advertising agency. Both Chipsters previously worked for The Courier-Journal in Louisville, Ky.

Chloe Thompson (Summer 2008) is an editorial assistant for The Magazine Group in Washington, D.C., where she previously was an intern.

Eric Bolin (Summer 2006) is internal communications and public relations coordinator for Hard Rock Hotel & Casino in Tulsa, Okla. He continues to work part-time for ESPN, his previous employer, and also freelances for the Tulsa World.

Personal Best:

Lorinda Toledo (front row, second to the right) with her fellow runners.

Lorinda Toledo (Summer 2008) in March completed the 25th annual Los Angeles Marathon, whose course ran from Dodger “Stadium to the Sea” in Santa Monica. The race was a fundraiser for AIDS Project Los Angeles. “The morning of the race was crisp and beautiful, and as I watched the multi-colored throng of 25,000 runners surge out of the stadium and out onto Sunset Boulevard, I could not hold back a huge smile. In fact, I don’t think I stopped smiling for the first 10 miles!” she says. But by miles 13 through 23, “my feet felt like they were barely scraping the ground…Despite the pain, I finished the (26.2-mile) marathon in 5:30:09 — in the middle of the pack of 22,000 finishers.”

Talia Buford (Summer 2004) and Nicole Santa Cruz (Spring 2009) also are training for fundraiser runs. Talia hits the road May 2 in the Cox Providence (R.I.) Rhode Races Half Marathon on behalf of the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society, while Nicole plans to run a marathon in San Francisco in July for AIDS Project Los Angeles.

Wedding:

Sharryn Harvey (Summer 2006) married Keidron Dotson on March 20 at the Metropolitan Baptist Church in Tulsa, Okla. Harvey is an online editor for PennWell Publishing’s Power Engineering magazine and Dotson is a reporter for KJRH-TV (NBC) in Tulsa. The couple took a cruise of the eastern Caribbean for their honeymoon.

Keep your news coming. Send updates to Michelle Hedenskoog.