In a national contest sponsored by the Columbia Scholastic Press Association, (CSPA), the judges selected Bear Facts as a Silver Crown Winner.

Only 15 high school newspapers in the nation earned that distinction.  Only 26 high school newspapers had been finalists for the special award, which recognizes an elite group of newspapers.

The Crown Award Ceremony was held recently at the CPA's 77th Annual Scholastic Convention on the Columbia University campus in New York City.

"Our Staff really worked together very hard, and I'm very proud of our group," said senior Lisa Jacobs, co-editor in chief.

In addition, senior staff artist Jen Hernandez earned two Gold Circle Awards, which recognizes overall individual achievement at a national level.

She earned Third Place in the Art/Illustration category and a Certificate of Merit in the Cartooning (Portfolio of Work) category.

Hernandez has earned awards for Columbia in three out of her four high school years in this contest.

In a separate judging by Columbia, the judges gave the newspaper 932 points out of a possible 1000, awarding Bear Facts a Gold Medallist  rating.

The areas that are ranked included coverage, writing and editing, graphic presentation and business operations.

Bear Facts earned the "All Columbian" level for writing and editing and graphic presentation, recognizing the publication for achieving the 95th percentile or higher in each of the categories.  

Crown Awards are in addition to any All-Columbian Honors received and supersede the Gold Medallist rating.

"This is a tribute to the hard work, talent and dedication of the entire staff," said John Tagliareni, Bear Facts adviser, "we always have so many terrific students."

"Since the judging is based on last year's issues, the graduates, who were the editors, deserve to be recognized, as well as our current staff members who contributed last year," he said.

Tagliareni praised co-editors-in chief Sabah Chaudhry, Cynthia Jacob and Allison Wortche who were the editors of last year's staff.

Earlier this year, Bear Facts received 14 awards from the Garden State Scholastic Association and won Second Place for Overall Excellence