Back to back and cementing a team into the record books.

The Kansas City Chiefs know what it takes to win a Super Bowl for two straight years (2023 and 2024). So do the Los Angeles Lakers (2009 and 2010) and the Tamba Bay Lightning (2020 and 2021).

While journalism is not a sport, it does have competitions at a national as well as global level. And last month, The Accolade, which publishes a news magazine and posts stories and multimedia content online, joined the back-to-back champions club for the first time in the program’s nearly 65-year history.

The National Scholastic Press Association [NSPA] has awarded a Pacemaker plaque for the four specialty news magazines the Advanced Journalism and Journalism 1 classes produced during the 2023-2024 school year. The honor, which came to only 18 other high school newspapers/news magazines worldwide with The Accolade being the only one from Southern California, comes on the heels of last year’s Pacemaker for the six newspaper issues the journalism students produced in the previous school year.

VIDEO CUTLINE: The 2024-2025 Accolade staff celebrates the Pacemaker recognition as adviser Tommy Li leads the chant during fourth period on Tuesday, Nov. 12. (Video by Accolade photo editor Noah Lee)

Accolade adviser Tommy Li didn’t find out about the recognition until Veterans Day weekend when the NSPA posted the results of its Nov. 9 Pacemaker awards ceremony on its Facebook page. The event, which neither Li nor his staff had the financial resources to attend, was held during the NSPA’s national journalism convention in Philadelphia from Nov. 7-10.

“In addition to demonstrating excellence in key areas including coverage, writing, editing, design and photography, the winning newspapers/news[magazines] took risks and served as a strong voice for its student audience,” said Gary Lundgren, associate director and coordinator of the Pacemaker competition, in the NSPA’s Facebook news release.

Li said the biggest risk his 2023-2024 staff took was switching from delivering the news in a newspaper format to a newsmagazine one. He also spent the previous school year researching the NSPA’s specialty newsmagazine category, even contacting Lundgren at the start of the 2023-2024 school year to better understand it and to receive initial feedback on whether the first issue last year was on the right track.

“I’m grateful for not only Lundgren’s feedback, but also that of so may other resources I used as well as the top editors from last year, especially editor-in-chief Jaimie Chun, who was willing to do something historic and produce a completely new product for our readers,” Li said. “Chun was willing to take the risk with me that we may not get recognized for what we do, but at least we could start a precedent for future top editors to follow in switching to a magazine format.”

That’s also what Lundgren echoed in the Pacemaker winner news release from the NSPA’s Facebook page.

“With most news being delivered online, student journalists have been redefining their print newspaper,” he said. “More and more that means transitioning from a traditional newspaper format to a specialty magazine with in-depth reporting.”

In keeping with the in-depth reporting concept, each of the four magazines featured a theme that started with the same “Re-” prefix: “Recognition” for the September issue, “Recovery” for the December issue, “Reframing Safety” for the March issue and “Remembering” for the May Senior Issue.

“For our first issue, we happened to decide on recognition and by coincidence our second issue also began with ‘re-‘, so Mr. Li suggested trying again, and we liked the resilient ring it had to it, so we decided to have the same pattern going for the rest of our issues,” said Chun, who learned of the Pacemaker award through a text message from the current editor-in-chief and is a freshman majoring in journalism at Northwestern University in Illinois. “I remember a wave of surprise and pride washing over me when I first heard the news.

“To win a Pacemaker, let alone be a finalist, is such a prestigious recognition.”

Li surprised the staff upon students’ return from the three-day Veterans Day holiday weekend on Nov. 12 with a fourth-period celebration during the Advanced Journalism class. Students were treated to Costco mega cupcakes and Martinelli’s sparkling cider mini-glass bottles.

Gallery • 3 Photos

Noah Lee

Staffers pick up their mega-sized cupcakes and Martinelli sparkling cider bottles in the back of Room 138, The Accolade room, during fourth period Tuesday, Nov. 12.

“Honestly, I felt really accomplished having received such a prestigious award with all the people on staff who took part in making the issue what it was, even if I contributed through an infographic,” Feature editor junior Nicole Park said. “I also really enjoyed our celebrations with the cider and cupcake — it was a nice treat to celebrate and also encourage me to continue to work for our upcoming issues.”

This year’s editor-in-chief, senior Alexxa Berumen, said Li has established a culture in which staffers are expected to produce award-winning, Los Angeles Times quality work.

“I think that we definitely have the knowledge of how to win,” Berumen said. “We have a possibility of being able to win the next award, but we need to work on communication as a staff overall.”

For next year’s Pacemaker contest, because of more changes to what the Advanced Journalism class plans to produce this school year, The Accolade aims to compete in the regular newspaper/newsmagazine and the specialty magazine categories.

“That will put us against some of the elite programs like those in Texas,” Li said. “In the meantime, I keep pointing to one of the framed pieces in front of the classroom that reads, ‘STAY humble,’ because we don’t want to just rest on our laurels — we still have lots to accomplish.”