State High School Journalist of the Year winners announced

Kinston High School journalist Resita H. Cox has been named the 2012 Rachel Rivers-Coffey North Carolina High School Journalist of the Year. Cox serves as editor of her high school newspaper, The Viking Press, in Kinston.

Alternates are Amulya Uppalapati of First Flight High in Kill Devil Hills and Samantha Sabin of Northwest School of the Arts in Charlotte.

Since 2001, the North Carolina Press Foundation (NCPF) has funded the annual scholarship award in memory of Rachel Rivers-Coffey, journalist and former N.C. Press Association president. NCPF will award a $2,000 scholarship to Cox. The two alternates will each receive $500.

The foundation will also award the winners' journalism programs. The Journalist of the Year’s program will receive $500. The two alternates’ programs will each receive $250.

Cox will now represent the state in the National High School Journalist of the Year scholarship competition. Winners will be announced April 15 at the National High School Journalism Convention in Seattle.

The Rivers-Coffey state scholarships will be awarded June 21 at UNC-Chapel Hill during the N.C. Scholastic Media Institute, a summer journalism workshop open to students and teachers across the state.