Bakersfield College’s student newspaper, The Renegade Rip, and the online publication, therip.com, earned national honors during the Best of Show competition during the Associated Collegiate Press conference Feb. 18-21 at the Sheraton Universal in Los Angeles.

The Rip’s website placed second in the nation in the large-school division among four-year colleges and two-year colleges.

The newspaper placed ninth among community college newspapers in the nation.

The competition picks up to 10 winners nationwide in each category.

For Best of Show, only one newspaper could be turned in for judging, and the Rip staff chose its latest edition from Feb. 18. The website was judged in its current form.

Rip students were also honored during the California Colleges Media Association awards ceremony Feb. 19 at the conference.

Entries from content published in the 2015 calendar year were eligible for judging.

Brooke Howard, an editor on The Rip last year and currently finishing her AAdegree at BC, placed first for column writing, and Elka Wyatt, a former Rip reporter and also working on her AAat BC, placed first for arts-and-entertainment reporting with a story about the local drive-in group Cinertain.

Also, former Rip editor in chief Elizabeth Castillo, now a journalism student at Cal State- Chico, won third place for best editorial, and current Rip editor in chief Mason J. Rockfellow and photo editor Joe Bergman won honorable mention for best photo package with a full page of sports photos in the December 2015 edition.

Adozen students, with journalism professor Danny Edwards and photo instructor John Harte, attended the ACPconference.

The conference featured more than 100 workshops covering all phases of journalism, tours of the Los Angeles Times and other media outlets, and included the awards ceremonies for CCMA and Best of Show.