The HCP Marionette staff won several awards at the 99th annual OSM Spring Media Monday on the OU campus.

Sophomore Isis Frazier won third place in the Online News Reporting category.

“It felt good to win an award when it was my first time,” she said.

Senior Callie Struby received third place in the Online Opinion category and second place in the Blog Entry category. She was conflicted about her success.

“At least I know I didn’t strike out. But I was slightly disappointed,” Struby said. She recalled winning first place her sophomore year for a food review. “I’m going to chalk it up less to my skill and more to judging that year.”

Sophomore Camila Gonzalez was awarded an honorable mention and first place in the Online Opinion category.

Junior Stephanie Emerson won second and third place in the Online Photo Gallery category.  She also won first place in the Sports category for a collaboration with senior Hannah Malzahn, who won in that category last year.

“I was happy to take that title again,” Malzahn said.

“I didn’t expect to win first. It makes me want to put more work into my slideshows in the future to try to get that again,” Emerson said.

Junior Elizabeth Brosius said she was ecstatic to receive first place in both the Multimedia Package and Video Package categories.

“I didn’t realize I would get two awards. That made it fun. I didn’t realize I got a second award because I was still too focused on the first,” Brosius said.

The Marionette website received Highest Honors and the All-Oklahoman award. The Marionette has won this award several times, but did not last year. News adviser Kelli Taylor said it felt like “redemption to get it back.”

“The staff absolutely deserved it. They worked their butts off,” Taylor said.

Every online site entered received a score based on things such as grammar and ease of accessibility. HCP was given 937 out of a possible 970 points.

The April 6 event also consisted of writing seminars that specialize in everything from opinion writing to journalism in other countries to public relations.  News staffs from all over Oklahoma attended. 88 schools participate in the OSM program and 34 were there.

Members of the HCP staff attended several seminars. It was sophomore Vanessa Hernandez’s first time attending the event.

“It made me feel more comfortable with writing,” she said. Hernandez attended a seminar called Stop Being Boring, in which students discussed titles and leads and improved each other’s stories. “(The speaker) made me think outside the box,” Hernandez said.