The annual Awards for Publishing Excellence (APEX) this year presented SWE Magazine with three Grand Awards, the organization’s highest honor, and five Awards of Excellence. The magazine received recognition in the categories of electronic media and podcasting; writing; magazines, journals and tabloids; and design and illustration.
This international competition for communications professionals is in its 35th year. These awards recognize the work of corporate, independent, and nonprofit publishers, writers, editors, graphic designers, illustrators, and photographers, who create content for print, web, electronic, and social media platforms.
Submissions this year totaled more than 1,100 for which 100 Grand Awards were presented to honor outstanding work in 14 major categories, with 453 Awards of Excellence recognizing exceptional work in 100 subcategories.
Grand Awards
Grand Award recipients are Anne Perusek, director of editorial and publications, and Troy Eller English, SWE archivist; Marsha Lynn Bragg, associate editor, and Christine Coolick, contributing writer; and JoAnn Dickey, art director.
Perusek and Eller English received recognition in the electronic media – podcast category for the podcast “What Happened in 1957: A Turning Point in SWE’s Journey Toward Inclusion,” part of the recurring Diverse: A SWE podcast series. The duo’s discussion focused on events that took place in 1957 that led to a turning point in SWE’s journey toward inclusion.
“When Women Blow the Whistle,” written by Coolick, and its companion piece, “Former FBI Agent and Whistleblower Finds New Purpose,” written by Bragg, earned honors in the writing category. The two stories appeared as a digital exclusive in the magazine’s Conference 2022 issue and explored why many of the prominent whistleblowers in the technology sector have been women, as well as what tends to happen when one blows the whistle on a company’s wrongdoing or malfeasance.
Dickey earned Grand Award honors in the design and illustration category for the Spring 2022 feature spread titled “Food Waste: A $2.8 Trillion Loss or Golden Opportunity?” Her design featured mounds of oranges, both used and unused, to illustrate the massive amount of waste that eventually hits landfills each year.
Awards of Excellence
SWE Magazine’s editorial contributors were central to the publication’s earning additional awards for exceptional work. APEX honored Seabright McCabe, contributing writer, with two Awards of Excellence in the writing – series category for articles she wrote that focused on the use of hydrogen in different modes of transportation. Although McCabe wrote these stories in separate magazine issues, the theme of hydrogen as an alternative fuel source remained consistent. The stories included “How About Hydrogen?” in the Fall 2022 issue; “All Aboard! World’s First Hydrogen-Powered Trains Debut in Germany,” in the Conference 2022 issue; and “Hydrogen Fuel Cell Aviation Readies for Takeoff,” in the Winter 2023 issue.
McCabe received a second Award of Excellence in the writing – features category for the story “Dance and Stem: A Fascinating Duet” and its sidebar, “Dancing Toward STEM Diversity,” published in the Winter 2023 issue.
In the magazines, journals and tabloids category, Perusek earned an Award of Excellence for “The State of Women in Engineering: Analyzing 20 Years of Social Science Literature,” SWE’s 2022 research issue. The annual publication offers a deep dive into the literature and research published in a given year on the status of women in STEM disciplines.
The electronic media – podcast category earned Perusek and Eller English an Award of Excellence for a segment in the Diverse: a SWE podcast series, “Lost Women of Science on Y.Y. Clark.” The podcast features their conversation with Carol Sutton Lewis, J.D., co-host of The Lost Women of Science podcast series, and Nora Mathison, senior editor and social media manager for the series.
APEX again recognized Dickey in the design and illustration – covers category for the Spring 2022 cover, “Agriculture Turns to AI,” which shows an expansive wheat field with a small drone flying overhead.
SWE Magazine has earned honors each year since the publication entered its first submission in 1998. The APEX Awards are sponsored by Communications Concepts Inc., an organization that advises publishing, public relations, and marketing professionals on best practices to improve their publications and communications programs. Communications Concepts has published Writer’s Web Watch, the Writing That Works Archives, and their predecessors since 1984.
