Senior Rachel Grant of North Little Rock, a writer for the UALR student newspaper, won first place in feature writing last week at the Arkansas College Media Association contest in Jonesboro, one of 21 prizes the publication collected.

Eight members of “The Forum” staff were recognized for their work. This year, the staff won the most awards ever. They competed with student journalists from the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville, Arkansas State University, University of Central Arkansas, Harding University, John Brown University, Ouachita Baptist University, Arkansas Baptist, Southern Arkansas University, and other institutions around the state.

Zach Smith of Little Rock, a graduate student in the School of Mass Communications, won first place for a single advertisement and two third place awards for single ad entries; second place for general column writing; third place for featuring writing; and honorable mentions for meeting and speech coverage and general column writing.

Sophomore Liz Sendejo and senior Seth Willis, both of Little Rock, received honorable mention for in-depth news reporting. Willis also received a third place and an honorable mention for review writing.

Sophomore Harrison Mitchell of Maumelle won an honorable mention for news photo.

Brandon Griffin of Roseville, Minn., a senior, won third place for sports column writing, and junior Steve Thrash of Benton won two honorable mentions for sports story writing.

Senior Felicia Russell of Sherwood, the paper’s editor-in-chief, won third place awards for editorial writing and sports page layout. She also won honorable mentions for front page layout and feature page layout.