Times Honors High School Journalists

Local winners of The Times’ High School Journalism Awards were honored at the newspaper’s San Fernando Valley Edition headquarters in Chatsworth.

The students were among hundreds of teenage journalists and school papers entered in The Times’ competition this year. This was the first year the contest has been open to students outside the paper’s Orange County Edition, where the contest started in the early 1980s.

Winners from the paper’s entire Southern California distribution area will be honored July 20 at the Harry Chandler Auditorium at Times Mirror Square.

Those honored Wednesday in Chatsworth included:

* Noah Strote of Harvard-Westlake High in Studio City, who won the news story category for an article that revealed students often used drugs on campus. Strote and Andrew Solomon took the staff editorial award for an article critical of various incidents of vandalism and theft at the school.

* Nick Edwards of Camarillo High, who won the feature story category for an article about a teen who started a skateboard company. Luis Chavarin of Channel Islands High in Oxnard, won the feature photograph category for a picture of flamenco dancers in mid-shuffle during Cinco de Mayo.

* Eric Ferkel of Harvard-Westlake High, who won the sports article category for a story about sports injuries. Eric Cheung of Thousand Oaks High, took the cartoon award for depicting a recent squabble over school funds.

* Asa Marie Hastings Standfeldt IV of Ventura High, who won the arts and entertainment story category for a review of a book about suppressed women.

The students each received $250. El Tigre, San Fernando High’s school paper, and the Student Voice, of the Buckley School in Sherman Oaks, each won a general excellence award and $1,000 toward journalism programs.