Senior Riley Shankman, reigning champi- on in Editorial Writing, placed second at the Illinois High School Association (IHSA) State Journalism Championships on April 26, while sophomore Zoha Suteria took second place for advertising and sophomore Anna Ivanov took fifth place for yearbook caption writing, Bob Wysocki, English Teacher and Advisor of The Oracle, said.

In total, The Oracle sent seven students to state, including Ivanov, Suteria, and Shank- man, as well as juniors Sofia Cole, Kate Sham- bo, and Kaitlyn Jiang, and sophomore Mere- dith Bill. These editors qualified for state after placing in the top three in their sectionals on April 2. In total, 1,011 high school journalists participated in sectionals, and 421 competed at the state competition at Heartland Communi- ty College in Normal, Illinois, Wysocki said. At the competition, students competed to create different journalistic products, he explained.

“All the best writers in the state come togeth- er in a classroom, and they have 90 minutes to write an article or create some sort of journalis- tic piece for a newspaper,” Shankman said.

Ivanov competed in Yearbook Caption Writ- ing, meaning she was given information and a series of photos and then she had to write a caption for those photos. Because it was Ivan- ov’s first time at the state competition, she was ready to take on the challenge.

“I felt very honored to represent The Oracle,” Ivanov said. “I was excited to place 5th in a cat- egory I had never competed in before.”

Suteria competed in the Advertising catego- ry. She was given information about a job list- ing for an ad, and she used Canva to create thepromotion based on the information provided, Suteria said.

This was Shankman’s second time compet- ing in Editorial Writing and had to write an editorial calling for a change, Shankman said.

“It was super exciting to be able to compete at state again,” Shankman said. “I felt so lucky to be able to compete twice and place both times.”

For Wysocki these competitions are an op- portunity for students to receive validation and recognition for all the hard work they put in throughout the year.

“Kids who are talented in writing, editing, or designing should be recognized and rewarded,” Wysocki said.