2022 Tower among best collegiate yearbooks in nation

Northwest Missouri State University’s Tower yearbook was recognized March 11 by Associated Collegiate Press (ACP) as one of three Pacemaker Award recipients, crowning it as one of last year’s best college yearbooks and making it a winner of the award for the second consecutive year.

The 2022 Tower yearbook

Tower joined yearbooks produced in 2022 by Ouachita Baptist University and Kansas State University staffs as Pacemaker recipients announced during the ACP Spring National College Media Conference in San Francisco.

“It’s always a great honor just to be nominated for a Pacemaker, but winning one is the icing on the cake for the hard work our student journalists pour into that publication to document the history of the year at Northwest,” said Steven Chappell, the director of student publications at Northwest. “To be recognized – repeatedly – as one of the best student media programs in the nation through this award demonstrates the strength of our mass media program and depth of talent of both our faculty and students.”

In addition, Northwest student media picked up the following honors in ACP’s Best of Show awards.

• First place, Broadcast Sports Story: Skyler Stamps, KNWT, “The Bearcats are MIAA champs”
• Third Place, Yearbook: Tower
• Third Place, Advertising Design: Jerilynn Hoover, The Northwest Missourian, “Gray’s Truck Stop”
• Seventh Place, Newspaper/Newsmagazine (four-year campus, 15,000 students or fewer): The Northwest Missourian

First published in 1917, the Tower yearbook annually documents campus life and personalities through writing, photography and design. The 2022 Tower adopted “Embodied” as its theme in recapping the 2021-2022 academic year at Northwest.

All collegiate yearbooks produced during the 2021-22 school year competed against each other. A team of three nationally recognized judges selected the 10 Pacemaker finalists, three of which were named as award recipients.  

ACP began presenting the prestigious Pacemaker Award to collegiate newspapers after the organization’s founding in 1921, making it one of the oldest awards for collegiate journalism. In the years since, yearbooks, magazines and websites were added to the competition.

Both the Tower yearbook, now a 12-time Pacemaker recipient, and The Northwest Missourian, a two-time Pacemaker recipient, are members of the ACP Hall of Fame.