CINDY ELLEN RUSSELL / CRUSSELL@STARBULLETIN.COM Ka Mo'i, the Kamehameha Schools-Kapalama campus newspaper, won the Top Overall Newspaper award yesterday at the annual Hawaii High School Journalism Contest. Pictured with the perpetual award are Kamehameha students Anuhea Akamine, left, Erica Weber, Corinn Perry and Abigail Trenhaile, Ka Mo'i editor in chief. CLICK FOR LARGE

Kamehameha wins journalism award

» Most Valuable Staffers named
» Download newspaper page PDF

FOR THE FIRST time in 37 years, the Kamehameha Schools-Kapalama campus newspaper was the best overall paper in the Hawaii High School Journalism Contest.

Kamehameha's paper, Ka Mo'i, beat Nanakuli Intermediate and High School by one point with Hawaii Baptist Academy taking third for top overall high school papers in the state.

"I can't even count the number of hours we spent working on the paper," said Lionel Barona, faculty adviser for Kamehameha's Ka Mo'i for the past three years. "For most of the editors and myself, this has become our lives for the last couple of years."

In recent years the top winners were the student papers of Farrington and Waianae high schools. When announcing this year's winner, presenter and Advertiser Editor Mark Platte said he had to look in the record books to see the last time this paper had won. It was 1970.

Cheers erupted when he announced it was Kamehameha Schools.

"All of us didn't know we were going to win," said Kapiolani Street, a senior at Kamehameha Schools and a copy editor for Ka Mo'i. "We knew we hadn't won for a while and had hoped it would be us. Our work is finally being validated."

The 24 staffers of Ka Mo'i meet two weekends a month to lay out the monthly paper, sometimes staying from 10 a.m. to 2 a.m., Barona said. Some of their work included coverage on Doe v. Kamehameha, a case that had garnered national media attention, and an in-depth piece on the so-called Akaka Bill.

The students of Nanakuli Intermediate and High School's paper, Ka Leo O Nanakuli, were also surprised that they won second place and were not disappointed that they were only one point behind.

There is no news-writing class at Nanakuli. Instead, they meet every Saturday from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m., usually arriving an hour early to get work done with a staff of just seven students.

"Being that it's not a regular class, for these seven kids to take second place, it's amazing," said faculty adviser Robin Kitsu, who hopes that next year the school will hold a news-writing class.

Danielle Choate, Ka Leo O Nanakuli's editor in chief and a junior, said she was proud of their coverage on the debate over splitting the intermediate and high school, a story that won the state award for feature writing.

"We're overwhelmed," Choate said. "It's good to be recognized for our hard work, and it's great that all the schools here got the recognition they deserved."

Most Valuable Staffers

Selected by the staff of each high school newspaper

CLICK FOR LARGE