By Mark Harden / SPJ Colorado Pro communications chair

Hello, and welcome to our end-of-2025 edition of the newsletter of the Society of Professional Journalists Colorado Pro Chapter.

It’s been an eventful year for our chapter, and we’re also in the thick of contest season. Here’s the latest. (For more, visit our website.)

Act now to get a discount on SPJ membership

If you’re not already a member, we’d love to have you join us — but you’ll need to move quickly. The deadline is Dec. 31 at 9:59 p.m. MT to take advantage of SPJ’s “Piggy” promotion (a reference to a certain nasty incident at the White House) and get $15 off membership in both national SPJ and the Colorado Pro chapter. Click here for details on how to join or extend your membership. And learn more here about membership benefits.  

Colorado chapter honored

SPJ Colorado Pro has been named by national SPJ leaders as Region 9 finalist for outstanding small professional chapter of 2024-25. (Region 9 covers Colorado, Utah, New Mexico and Wyoming). The honor is “in recognition of [the chapter’s] outstanding programs and activities that enhance professionalism, thereby contributing service to the Society and to the profession.”

Help us develop a journalism awareness curriculum

SPJ Colorado Pro is joining with the Colorado Press Association, the Colorado Broadcasters Association and others to develop a curriculum to train Colorado journalists to deliver presentations to non-journalists about what we do and how we operate. Board members Michael Karlik and Thelma Grimes are heading up the project for our chapter.

Through Feb. 1, 2026, we’re seeking your ideas and feedback on what the curriculum should include. Click here for more information.

New board members

In July 2025 we welcomed Michael de Yoanna, Thelma Grimes and Michael Karlik to the SPJ Colorado Pro chapter board, and selected Deb Hurley Brobst as chapter president for 2025-26. (Learn more about them here.) Then, in November, Isabel Guzman joined the board. (Meet her here.) And click here to meet the rest of our board.

Top of the Rockies contest is now open for entries

Your news outlet has until Jan. 26, 2026, to submit entries to SPJ’s Top of the Rockies Excellence in Journalism contest. It’s a regional, multi-platform contest for professional reporters and news organizations in Colorado, New Mexico, Utah and Wyoming. The contest has more than 50 categories for content published in 2025. Media outlets compete based on their newsroom size. Click here for contest rules, categories, and information. 

SPJ’s national contest is also open

Entries are now being accepted for national SPJ’s Sigma Delta Chi awards, honoring excellence in professional journalism across print/online, audio, television and more in 2025. The deadline is Feb. 18, 2026, but you’ll save on entry fees if you enter by Jan. 6, 2026. You’ll also save if you join SPJ. Details here.

Students: Mark of Excellence Awards now open

SPJ’s contest for excellence in student journalism is open for entries through Feb. 11, 2026, but you’ll save on entry fees if you enter by Jan. 6, 2026. You’ll also save if you join SPJ. Regional and national awards are presented, and there’s also a contest for best student newspapers. Details here.

This year, student journalists from University of Colorado Boulder and the University of Denver won national Mark of Excellence honors. Here are this year’s regional winners.

Coming soon: Individual award nominations

Be thinking about which outstanding Colorado journalists and allies you’d like to nominate for our chapter’s prestigious individual awards. Each year we bestow the Keeper of the Flame Award (for career achievement), Journalist of the Year, Educator of the Year and the First Amendment Award to Colorado’s “best of the best.” The call for nominations will go out early in the coming year. (Click here for a list of past winners.)

Save the date: Awards reception

Our Top of the Rockies and individual awards will be presented Saturday, April 25, 2026, at 5:30 p.m. at a reception in Denver. Registration details to come.

Students: Apply now for scholarships

SPJ Colorado Pro has opened applications for scholarships of up to $5,000 to journalism students from or living in Colorado. The scholarships are open to high school seniors and college and university students attending any accredited U.S. college or university. The deadline for applications is Feb. 14, 2026. Details here.

Watch us on YouTube

Our chapter YouTube channel is up and running. Stream our recent events, watch our awards presentations and more. Watch here, and subscribe to keep tabs on all the action.

Help us plan 2026 chapter events

In 2025, we offered several forums and other events, several of which you can watch on YouTube, including Kevin Flynn’s April 5 keynote address at our Region 9 Conference; our Sept. 30 forum on citizen journalism; our Oct. 14 book talk with Denver’s Kurt Wagner, author of Battle for the Bird, a history of X (a.k.a. Twitter); and our Nov. 4 talk by Justin Adams of CBS Colorado about Theodore “Bubbles” Anderson, Colorado’s only Negro Leagues player.

A tip of the hat to our programs chair, Marco Cummings, aided by board members Doug Bell and Corey Hutchins, for organizing these events (and to Marco for putting them on YouTube). Got an idea for a future event – or better yet, would you like to help put one together? Contact Marco atmarco@marcocummings.com.

Update guide to Colorado’s Sunshine Laws

Our friends at the Colorado Freedom of Information Coalition have updated their free online guide to Colorado’s open-government laws with links to relevant 2025 statutes and recent court rulings. Click here.

In case you missed it

Here’s our Oct. 21 chapter newsletter.

Stay in touch with SPJ Colorado Pro online, on Facebook, on LinkedIn, on Bluesky and on X.

That’s all for now. Here’s wishing you a happy, healthy year of robust, honest Colorado journalism in 2026!