After Echo received a National Newspaper Pacemaker award for the previous school year’s print editions, editor-in-chief Madeline Schutte believes the Echo’s awards are a reflection of its staffers commitment.

“(The awards) really just show all of our hard work and dedication because I’ve never met a staffer on Echo who isn’t completely dedicated and trying their best at all times,” Schutte said.

Echo has been a National Newspaper Pacemaker Finalist every year since 2010 and has won the award five times since. This year, only 21 newspapers won a National Pacemaker. Echo is the only school from Minnesota on the newspaper list. Along with the National Newspaper Pacemaker Echo also received numerous individual awards.

Last year’s Editor-in-chief, Marta Hill was astonished by her honorable mention for national news broadcast of the year for her impeachment video.

“When I saw on the website that (it) was one of the honorable mentions I was like ‘woah’ it was mind blowing; it was unexpected compared to some of the other stuff and that was really cool,” Hill said. “We spent so much time (on the video), Maggie Klaers spent hours and hours animating and Talia Lissauer did a lot of research, we put so much time into it but we didn’t think it would go anywhere so it was really cool to be recognized for that.”

Schutte said the awards emphasize the passion Echo staffers have for the publication despite the struggles that come with being a student journalist.

“A lot of challenges come up when you’re a student journalist, but to persist through that and keep going and even go as far as to win awards, it just really highlights the dedication that Echo staffers have,” Schutte said.