Student Publication Association Awards 2025: A night to remember

Hi WIJ network, I’m Marine Saint (contributor at the Financial Times) one of the new Student Liaison officers alongside Freya Shaw (City Investigations MA and freelance video editor), writing to you after a successful weekend celebrating the best of UK student journalism!

WIJ was proud to sponsor the Student Publication Association Awards in Exeter this month, bringing together hundreds of young journalists and acclaimed speakers, a record 1,326 award entries and 220+ student publications. As the newest officers and producers of WIJ’s brand-new podcast ‘Inspire’ (launching next month!), we travelled down to Sandy Park, Exeter for a day of industry-wide panel talks, networking and the illustrious SPA 2025 awards presentation.

The weekend conference hosted many inspiring panelists, including our very own WiJ board member and digital journalism expert Sophia Smith Galer. Sophia shared her pioneering work in social media journalism, how it boosted her early career at the BBC and highlighted the future of content creation as a toolkit for aspiring journalists.

“The digital audience and younger audience have a wider definition of what is newsworthy,” said Sofia, pointing to her “irrepressible urge” to translate news into vertical videos – which led to her viral sea shanty Suez Canal video in March 2021.

From panel discussions on diverse perspectives in the industry, to speed mentoring and a student newspaper swap it was a truly uplifting and encouraging weekend for up-and-coming journalists.

We heard from Woman’s Hour host Nuala McGovern, who shared her journey from local radio at WNYC to now holding power to account and sharing important women’s stories from around the world at the BBC. Patience with sensitive sources, working with your team and always over-preparing for interviews were Nuala’s key tips. 

Being a woman in the field is often an advantage, and Nuala advised young women to be confident in their presence. “It can sometimes open doors to you. As a woman the industry is a lot better now. But you have to push back against pleasing people and being nice – have allies and people who are boosting you.”  

We connected with countless student publications across the UK, encouraging them to sign up to WIJ memberships and share our events with their writers. Hosting the weekend conference with the wonderful SPA team was Exeposé, the University of Exeter’s student publication. 

We caught up with their editor-in-chief Amy Rushton, who shared how meaningful it was to bring such a large, diverse event to an often forgotten part of Devon. Connecting with panellists and student journalists from around the country allowed for unique connections – “There just isn’t anything else like it to actually get to know other people doing what you’re doing,” Amy said.

The “Breaking the Stereotypes” panel was a standout moment for Amy, especially hearing from Andy Leake, LGBT+ editor of Bristol 24/7. “As a queer woman it was really fun to be able to sit on that panel and see that there are roles out there for specific marginalised communities,” added Amy.

SPANC 2025 culminated in a grande finale of awards, where we sponsored the Rising Star, picking from an incredibly strong shortlist of ten nominees. It was no easy feat, as all nominees had reported extensively, worked hard to innovate their student publications and showed great promise for a career in the industry. 

Our Highly Commended Rising Star, Sofia Lambis, is the News Investigations Editor for Epigram at the University of Bristol. “I’m so grateful to have received this award. Working on Epigram this year with an incredible team of editors, journalists and designers has truly inspired me to pursue a career in media,” shared Sofia. 

Our winner, chosen for her impressive range of stories including women’s safety issues and politically relevant work reported with emotional nuance, was the Glasgow Guardian’s News Editor Kate Bailey-Tonkin. 

“The Rising Star award means a lot to me,” said Kate. “Having my efforts recognised by the SPA and WiJ is incredibly validating and will no doubt encourage me to become more confident in my future work.”

Kate’s future goals include joining The New York Times’ Investigations Team and finding her niche. One of Kate’s role models in the media is CNN anchor Kaitlan Collins. “I admire her tenacity and willingness to ask tough questions, even when facing criticism from powerful figures like Trump,” shared Kate.

Along with hosting rising stars of the industry on the WIJ ‘INSPIRE’ podcast and producing insightful career conversations with the media’s most esteemed and courageous women, we hope to continue to build up our community of student journalists across the UK seeking their first connections, events and role models in the industry.