Earlier this spring, the Columbia Scholastic Press Association presented the Saratoga Falcon the “Gold Crown,” a prestigious journalism award.

The CSPA receives hundreds of newspapers, yearbooks and literary magazines and the panel of judges, who are former journalism advisers, or experienced journalists, critique the entries. 

The Falcon received the award for the 2012-2013 year issue under the category of High School Newspaper, the editors in chiefs being Jackie Gu and Debbie Soung. The Gold Crown is the top award in the contest, followed by the Silver Crown.

The judging criteria are based on all aspects of value to the reader: content, design, coverage, photography as well as writing and editing.

This is not the first time the Falcon has received a Crown award; it usually wins the award every two to three years.

Nevertheless, journalism adviser Michael Tyler said that winning is unpredictable.

“I honestly have no idea when the Falcon is going to win, because years when I think that the newspaper is really good, it receives no awards,” Tyler said. “I think [the whole winning process] is fluky.”

Gu said that the win came as a surprise to her since the paper has had the tendency to win Silver Crowns far more than Gold Crowns.

“Looking back, I often took the journalism program at SHS for granted, I sometimes forget how established it is and how lucky we are to be able to produce such a great newspaper,” Gu said.