November 9, 2026
The Corsair, SMC Journalism Students Win 44 National & Regional Awards
The Corsair, SMC Journalism Students Win 44 National & Regional Awards
Includes top Pacemaker and Pinnacle wins among U.S. student newsrooms
SANTA MONICA, CA — Santa Monica College’s (SMC) student-run media outlet The Corsair and its staff won 24 regional awards this fall from the Journalism Association of Community Colleges (JACC), plus four national honors from the Associated Collegiate Press (ACP) and 16 national awards from the College Media Association (CMA), including several first-place awards. The awards were announced at the JACC SoCal Conference held at Cal State Northridge on Oct. 10 and at the CMA/ACP Fall National College Media Convention held Nov. 5-7 in Kansas City, Mo.
The ACP honored The Corsair with its top Pacemaker award for multiplatform news outlets, one of 21 student newsrooms nationally to win the recognition, including Harvard and Northwestern University. In addition to SMC, seven other California student newsrooms won the Multiplatform Pacemaker: UCLA, Cal Poly San Luis Obispo, Cal State Long Beach, Cal State Sacramento, El Camino College, Las Positas College and Fullerton College.
“The prestigious Pacemaker recognizes overall excellence and distinguishes the top student media produced during a particular school year. The award started shortly after the association was founded in 1921 and is often regarded as the most-competitive, most-honored award in collegiate journalism,” according to the ACP announcement.
Malibu resident Sofia Kieser, 22, The Corsair’s editor-in-chief, won first place in the JACC SoCal regional copy-editing competition for the second year in a row.
“I’m proud that we’re continuing the legacy of all the student journalists who have come before us,” she said. Kieser hopes to pursue a career in music journalism, especially covering independent artists. “I’m interested in telling the stories we don’t get to see in the news as often.”
A full list of awards won by SMC’s student journalists & alumni follows:
College Media Association Pinnacle awards:
- First Place: A&E Story audio/video (Jenna Tibby and Mary Funsten); Photo Illustration (Guillermo De La Barreda); Breaking News Photo (Kayjel J. Mairena); News Photo Package (Kayjel J. Mairena, Jake Crandall).
- Second place: Sports Action/Game Photo (Tom Rosholt); Headline Writing (Jordi Garcia Sosa).
- Third Place: Feature Photo (Guillermo De La Barreda); Feature Photo Package (Kayjel J. Mairena); Coverage of Diversity (The Corsair Staff); General News Package audio/video (Jenna Tibby, Tim Sim, Jake Crandall); General News Photo (Jake Crandall), General News Story print/web (Kayjel J. Mairena).
- Honorable Mention: Media Website of the Year (The Corsair); Feature Package audio/video (Jenna Tibby, Carlos Perez); Podcast (Jeffrey Berrios, Tim Sim and Jenna Tibby); Sports Feature Photo (Kantapong Wongjirasawad).
Journalism Association of Community Colleges awards:
- First Place: On-the-Spot Copy Editing (Sofia Kieser) Video Hard News Reporting (Patrick Conlon, Eli Vikstrom).
- Second Place: Front Page Layout (The Corsair Staff); Online Photo Story/Essay (Kayjel J. Mairena); Opinion Story (Dillon Stafford); News Photo (Jake Crandall); Podcast/Audio News: (Jenna Tibby, Jeffrey Berrios, Tim Sim); On-the-Spot Feature Photo (Jules Frame).
- Third Place: On-the-Spot Copy Editing (Jacqueline Martin); On-the-Spot News Writing (Patrick Conlon); Photo Illustration (Guillermo De La Barreda); Feature Photo (Guillermo De La Barreda); Photo Story-Essay (The Corsair Staff); Environmental Portrait (Gregory Hawthorne); Inside Page Layout (Guillermo De La Barreda); Sports Action Photo (Tom Rosholt).
- Fourth Place: Photo Illustration (Fai Fong); Environmental Portrait (Elizabeth Bacher); Sports Action Photo (Silke Eichholz).
- Honorable Mention: On-the-Spot Opinion Writing (Jacqueline Martin); Critical Review (Christine Xolotl Muñoz); Online Photo Story/Essay (Elizabeth Bacher, Daniel Bowyer, Nicole Haun, Mary Funsten and Jose Aguila).
- Meritorious: Online General Excellence (The Corsair); Enterprise News Story/Series (Kayjel J. Mairena).
Associated Collegiate Press awards:
- Pacemaker: Multiplatform (The Corsair, editors in chief Katie Easterson and Sofia Kieser).
- Third Place: Breaking News Story (Kayjel J. Mairena).
- Honorable Mention: Sports Game/Action Photo (Silke Eichholz) Broadcast Feature Story (Jenna Tibby and Mary Funsten).
Guillermo De La Barreda won a first-place award from the College Media Association in the Illustration category for this photo illustration accompanying an article on the usage of psychedelics on Monday, Feb. 23, 2026, featuring Ava D. at his home in Santa Monica, Calif. Ava was photographed using a combination of different techniques involving slow shutter, flash with gels, specialized filters, and zoom burst. (Photo Credit: Guillermo De La Barreda | The Corsair)
Kayjel J. Mairena won a first-place CMA award in the Breaking News Photo category. In this prizewinning photo, a skateboarder performs a trick known as an acid drop off a Waymo in downtown Los Angeles on Oct. 25, 2025, during a riot at the Halloween Hellbomb event, a skateboarding competition sponsored by Monster Energy, Thrasher and Vans at the intersection of North Hill and West First streets. (Photo Credit: Kayjel J. Mairena | The Corsair)
Kayjel J. Mairena and Jake Crandall won a first-place CMA award in the News Photo Package category for “Hellbomb was a Riot!” In this photo, taken by Crandall, a skateboarder rides down First Street next to the Halloween Hellbomb event hosted by Thrasher, Vans, and Monster Energy on Saturday, Oct. 25, 2025, in downtown Los Angeles, declared an unlawful assembly after participants began forming their own run adjacent to the event which spread into the street. (Photo Credit: Jake Crandall | The Corsair)
2026 Fall Corsair Editor-in-Chief Sofia Kieser indicates a second First Place win in two consecutive semesters in the On the Spot Copy Editing competition at the Journalism Associatiion of Community Colleges (JACC) Southern California Fall Conference held on Saturday, October 10, 2026 at California State University Northridge in Los Angeles, Calif. Kieser won First Place in the On-the Spot Copy editing category for the second semester in a row with a score of 91 percent. (Photo Credit: Gerard Burkhart)
Editor-in-Chief Katie Easterson led the Corsair for Fall 2025 and Spring 2026. She graduated in June and transferred to Cal State Dominguez Hills. Corsair managing editors included Mollie Bishop for Fall 2025 and Sofia Kieser for Spring 2026. This semester’s leaders are Editor-in-Chief Sofia Kieser and Managing Editor Vicki Mehdizadeh.
Several student journalists who graduated from SMC last June won awards, including former news editor Kayjel J. Mairena, who now attends USC. Mairena also won a photojournalism award for military veterans at the Eddie Adams Workshop in October.
The Corsair advising team includes journalism instructor Sharyn Obsatz, photojournalism instructor Gerard Burkhart (who won the 2026 California Community College Educator of the Year from the Journalism Education Collaborative and California Press Foundation), and social media journalism instructor Samantha Nuñez. The Corsair staff produces a newspaper in the spring and fall semesters, currently available on issuu.com/corsair.website, and publishes news content online at thecorsaironline.com. Follow The Corsair on Instagram @corsairnews.
“I’m always proud of them. They really put the work in,” Burkhart said. “They’re doing the job we need to see in a new generation of journalists to keep democracy alive and thriving.”
Santa Monica College’s journalism program offers career training in reporting and nonfiction storytelling across multiple platforms: print, photography, video, audio, social media, and digital media production. Students are prepared for roles including reporter, correspondent, editor, copywriter, audience engagement editor, social media content creator and broadcast producer. Those interested in joining The Corsair for the Spring 2027 semester can sign up for Journalism 16: Producing the Campus Newspaper; Journalism 22/Photo 14: Photography for Publication or Journalism 7/Media 25: Engaging Audiences for Journalism and Social Media. More information is available at smc.edu/journalism.
Santa Monica College is a California Community College accredited by the Acccrediting Commission for Community and Junior Colleges (ACCJC).
# # #