Indiana Public Radio (IPR) News, Ball State's public radio service, recently won six awards from the Society of Professional Journalists (SPJ). The IPR News staff consists of Brian Beaver, Marcus Jackman and Stan Sollars. In addition to the six professional awards, Jackman and students from the Virginia B. Ball Center for Creative Inquiry earned three SPJ awards in the Student Division.

The nine SPJ awards follow 18 Associated Press awards won last month by IPR News. At that time Beaver received a regional Edward R. Murrow Award from the Radio and Television Directors Association.

Beaver, the only full-time news correspondent for IPR News, received awards for

• First place, Best Radio Spot News, for "Marion Flood"
• First place, Best Radio General News, for "Efficiencies Commission"
• First place, Best Medical/Science Reporting
• Second place, Best Radio Feature, for "Afghan Girl Visits Benefactors"

Jackman received a second place for Best Coverage of Minority Issues for "Khabir Shareef, Storyteller." In addition, Jackman teamed up with students from the Virginia B. Ball Center on a series that earned three awards:

• First place, Best Radio Documentary or Series, for "Consuming a Nation"
• First place, Best Radio Feature, for "Consuming a Nation — The Changing Face of Ireland"
• Second place, Best Radio Feature, for "Consuming a Nation — Plastic Pubs"

"Consuming a Nation" was a spring 2005 seminar taught by Lauren Onkey, associate professor of English, at the Virginia Ball Center. The students' culminating activity of the semester was a feature series created for IPR about the effects of tourism on Ireland.

Sollars received second place, Best Radio Newscast, for the December 8, 2005, broadcast of NPR's "Morning Edition."

All SPJ entries were judged by broadcasters from Ohio.

A complete list of IPR's broadcast awards and online audio streaming can be found at www.bsu.edu/ipr.

Indiana Public Radio is a service of Ball State University, a Public Radio International affiliate and a National Public Radio member station. Its format includes NPR, news and classical music broadcast on WBST 92.1 FM, Muncie; WBSB 89.5 FM, Anderson; WBSW 90.9 FM, Marion; WBSJ 91.7 FM, Portland; and WBSH 91.1 FM, Hagerstown-New Castle.