Editor-in Chief Mike Williams says the paper still has bigger goals.

Danny Hooley, a former Echo editor, now serves as production manager.

The Society of Professional Journalists, the nation’s largest journalism organization, has awarded the Campus Echo the Merit of Excellence Award for best overall non-daily student newspaper in a region that includes Washington, D.C., Maryland, Virginia, and North Carolina.

“This is the biggest award our newspaper has ever won,” said Tom Evans, former adviser to the Echo and chair of the Department of English’s mass communications committee. “It is vital that a university have an independent and healthy student newspaper.”

Campus Echo editor-in-chief Mike Williams said he agrees with Evans but that this is a small step in where he envisions the paper next year.

“I am proud to have won the award but I have bigger goals for us than this,” said Williams. “Our main goal is not to stop here, but to keep improving and produce quality work more consistently.”

Williams said he loves the Echo and spends a lot of time working on ways to improve the paper. He pointed out that they did not just become a good newspaper overnight.

“Before me there was Ed Boyce, and before him it was Danny Hooley,” Williams said. “If it wasn’t for them, there would be no Campus Echo.”

Boyce was editor from 1999-2001, and Hooley held the position from 1998-1999. Currently , he is production manager.

Hooley has been with the Echo longer than any current staff member.

“In 1994, when I started working with the Echo, the staff was smaller and it took more effort trying to publish the paper,” Hooley said. “Now we have better equiptment, organization, and an adviser with managerial experience, and that has its advantages.”

The paper’s current adviser, Assistant Professor of English Bruce dePyssler, has been with the Echo since 1999. He came the NCCU from the University of the Incarnate Word in San Antonio.

Under dePyssler, the Incarnate Word’s publication, the Logos, won the same SPJ award.

“When I took over as adviser of the Echo, the issues were smaller, there wasn’t a single camera and there were just two working computers,” he said. “Now we have seven digital and 35mm cameras, eight computers, and three scanners including a negative scanner.”

The Echo won this award despite not having a communications department or a school of communications as most other schools in their region do.

“I will never be completely satisfied with the paper, but for us to win without the resources that other schools have shows that we are a dedicated bunch,” Williams said.

The SPJ award is not the first for the Echo. They have won several awards from the Black College Communication Association.

In 1999-2000 the paper won the BCCA’s award for best overall student newspaper, along with other individual awards.

In 2000-2001 the Echo won 14 awards including Best New Reporting, Best Sports Coverage, Best Online Edition, and Best Photography.

SPJ regional award winners automatically advance to compete in the national contest.