Central College came away with three more awards in the College Sports Communicators’ (formerly CoSIDA) Fred Stabley Sr. Writing Contest.
Central, which had two entries cited last year, was awarded first place in CSC District 7 for Historical Feature with a tribute to the late president emeritus Kenneth J. Weller with “Weller was the Father of Division III, but so much more.”
They also received first place in the district for Athlete Profile for a feature on Central’s Thomas Spoehr, who embraced a new career as a discus thrower after a promising men’s basketball career was cut short by injury in “Setback sparks new dream for Central’s Spoehr.”
Central was named runner-up in District 7 in the General Feature/Blog category for a story which appeared in Civitas, the college’s alumni magazine. The story profiled retired Dutch football defensive coordinator Don DeWaard, who transitioned to serving as Pella’s mayor in “The Mayor and the Coach.”
https://civitas.central.edu/2022/04/the-mayor-and-the-coach/
The entries were judged in a combined field that included NCAA Division I, II and III institutions as well as NAIA schools and two-year colleges. District 7 includes colleges and universities in Iowa, Missouri, Kansas, Colorado, Nebraska, Wyoming, Montana, North Dakota, South Dakota, Saskatchewan and Alberta.
All three stories were written by athletics communications director Larry Happel, who is in his 45th year in that role at Central. He previously won the CSC Fred Stabley Sr. Writing Contest National Story of the Year Award in 2017 and has now received 15 CSC writing awards overall as well as one from the Council for Advancement and Support of Education. He’s received more than 35 CSC publication awards and was inducted into the CSC Hall of Fame in 2010. He’s a former CSC board member and past D3SIDA president.