Independent staff members visited Seattle, WA for the 28th Annual ACP conference during the first weekend in March 2012. Staffers had an opportunity to meet and greet hundreds of other college writers, and professionals in the field of journalism, such as, Cheryl Phillips of The Seattle Times and Meredith Birkett of MSNBC.com.

ACP provided a vast number of workshops that ranged from “Newspaper Advertising Sales” to “Advanced Photojournalism”. The folks of Associated Collegiate Press provided students with professional critiques of their publications, and vendors showcased ways that student newspapers can streamline their production, and even go as far as creating Apps for smartphones.

A 59-year old recovering alcoholic from Texas with a wife, two ex-wives and four kids delivered relevant and useful information in a March 2 presentation. Mark Witherspoon a professor from Iowa State University gave a 2-hour profanity laced workshop called, “The Trifecta of Reporting.”

“I do not curse to offended, I curse to emphasize my point,” Witherspoon said after the crowd giggled when he dropped his first of many f-bombs. Witherspoons’ “Trifecta of Reporting” workshop taught the 40-plus journalism students how important research, observation and interviewing will be in their careers. Witherspoon stressed that these three subjects will help a journalist create a complete story, rich with detail. He went on to expand that everything has a life story and it is the reporter’s job to get that life story. “The shorts version sucks, we want the long version of the story,” Witherspoon said.

Witherspoon used his past experience of journalism, wives, drug and alcohol use to keep the students engaged and entertained. He told several stories from how he didn’t trust his instincts during last football game in high school, to getting tax documents from his college, to his time at the Fort Worth Star-Telegram covering a series of gang shootings. All of Witherspoon’s stories came to climax when he talked about how he didn’t dig deep enough to tell a complete story as a young reporter.

This passionate story of regret unfolded with a couple of gang shootings and as young reporter Witherspoon didn’t recognize that the police in Wichita Falls were racists and he wrote a straight news story. He told these stories because he didn’t want any of the future journalists in the room to carry the regret that has. “There ain’t nothing I can’t find out,” Witherspoon made all the students repeat this several times.

“[At the conference I enjoyed] meeting and connecting with a group of people with the same interest and goals,” said production editor, and Sophomore Nicholas Joly, “[I learned that] you must have structure, because that is the base of the paper.” Production tips and advice on making stories better were only part of the offerings at the conference.

Aside from, and including eccentric professors – the workshops delivered lots of information to participants. One highlight feature of the conference was the “Best of Show” awards ceremony, where the Independent staff walked away with two awards for the website and the print publication. This came just weeks after receiving three awards at the Illinois College Press Association Conference held in Chicago, February 17 and 18. The ICPA awards were 1st, 3rd, and 4th place for “Photo Essay”, “Feature Story”, “Photography”.