FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Sept. 30, 2011
Contact:
Tiffany McCallen
[email protected]
573-355-5201, ext. 2#
Religion News Spokane's Tracy Simmons
COLUMBIA, MO. — Former Creedible.com Editor and Publisher Tracy Simmons was recently announced as the winner of the 2011 Religion Newswriters Association’s Schachern Award for Online Religion Section of the Year. Winners for all 19 religion reporting awards in six major categories — newspapers, multiple media, magazines, broadcast, books and students — were announced Sept. 17 in Durham at RNA’s 62nd Annual Conference and Awards Banquet.
Judges praised Simmons’ work at Creedible, noting that the online religion publication has “…lots of good features, particularly on the Haiti entry. Good use of text, photos, slide shows and audio.”
Simmons, who has more than a decade of religion reporting experience, created Creedible.com in 2009, when her newspaper, the Waterbury (Conn.) Republican-American, eliminated the religion beat. She also covered faith stories for the Lubbock Avalanche Journal and the Victoria Advocate, both in Texas.
This summer, Simmons was hired as the inaugural editor and local community manager of Religion News LLC’s upcoming hyperlocal website project. Her site, Religion News Spokane, is slated to debut in early 2012 and will showcase nuanced, in-depth religion stories focused on the greater Spokane area, as well as national faith news from the award-winning newswire Religion News Service. Community contributors will provide another layer of insight through blogs, profiles and panel discussions.
Religion News Spokane is the first of up to 20 hyperlocal religion news websites that will debut over the next three years. The initiative is part of a $3.5 million grant to Religion News LLC (a new entity of the Religion Newswriters Foundation) from the Lilly Endowment. Read more about the grant and its partnering projects.
For news and updates on Religion News Spokane, subscribe to its “construction” blog, http://religionnewsspokane.wordpress.com. You can also find Religion News Spokane on Facebook, Twitter, Flickr and Foursquare.
