Our Workshop Team

Tracy Anderson advises The Communicator magazine and website at Community High School in Ann Arbor. The programs have received Spartan awards from MIPA, Pacemakers from NSPA, Story of the Year from NSPA, Design of the Year from NSPA, and numerous other awards. Anderson was selected to participate in the Reynold’s Institute at the Cronkite School of Journalism in Phoenix. She is also the recipient of a Golden Pen Award. She can’t wait to work with MIPA journalists and help them develop websites that engage their readers. Her goal is to get her workshop participants ready for the new school year with a vibrant, relevant website and social media plan in place.

Pam Bunka is the retired adviser of the Fentonian yearbook and InPrint newspaper at Fenton High School. Each received numerous MIPA, CSPA and NSPA awards, including Spartan, Crown and Pacemaker awards, during her time as adviser. She is a Golden Pen recipient. Bunka has taught at every MIPA summer workshop at MSU. She’s the only one here who can claim that honor! Bunka’s not always living and breathing journalism; in her spare time, she enjoys gardening and spending time with her grandchildren and their parents, John and Alexis, who is also a newspaper and yearbook adviser.

Ava Butzu teaches yearbook at Grand Blanc High School in Michigan and is a 2018 H.L. Hall Special Recognition Adviser. Her yearbook staff produces a 384-page book with extensive coverage/design. Her staff has earned awards at multiple levels, including CSPA Crowns and Pacemaker nominations. Ms. Butzu’s interest in approaching yearbook as a complete journalism and entrepreneurship team-building experience has encouraged her students to pursue design, writing, journalism, photography and marketing careers. She believes there is no greater honor than working with students who capture the moments and people at their school in meaningful, creative ways each year.

Michael Caterina is a multimedia photojournalist for the South Bend Tribune photographing local news, high school and Notre Dame football and basketball. After graduating from Lansing Everett High School, Caterina received a degree in photographic technology from Lansing Community College. Michael attended MIPA conferences in high school and helped instruct in the past. He is very excited to be teaching for his seventh year!

Elizabeth Cyr has found the secret to a happy life: helping young people unlock their potential. She’s been doing so at Stockbridge High School for two decades. Nothing makes her happier than helping students unleash their ideas through contemporary graphic design tools and strong journalism conventions. She coaches staffs on Uncaged News & Online and Panther yearbook. Her staffs have won numerous awards at the state and national levels including the MIPA Spartan, NSPA Pacemaker and CSPA Silver Crown. She was named the 2017 Golden Pen Adviser and earned the 2019 JEA Diversity Award. Follow her @queenof207 for cool stuff.

Bobby Hawthorne is an Austin writer, writing instructor and reporter and columnist for an education magazine you’ve never heard of. His columns deal mostly with himself and occasionally scholastic sports. He worked for the University Interscholastic League from 1977-2005. He is the author of The Radical Write and a couple of other small books, manuals and what-not. In 2006, he authored Longhorn Football: An Illustrated History. A year later, he produced the text for Home Field, a book of photos of Texas high school football stadiums. In 2009, he produced a 200-page history of the UIL for its centennial. He did it on time and only slightly over budget.

Michael Kaufman serves as the program director for LCPS-TV, is a connected educator with PBS Student Reporting Labs and teaches Broadcast Journalism at L’Anse Creuse. In 2019, Kaufman received both the Wall Street Journal Courageous Leader Award and the DAFT Media Teacher of the Year. In 2015, his TV & Broadcast Media program received the Education Excellence 2020 award from the State of Michigan School Boards Association. He was Michigan Theatre Teacher of the Year in 2004, a finalist for Michigan Teacher of the Year in 2005 and is Apple Certified in Final Cut Pro Editing Software.

Ike Lea heads the Photographic Imaging Program at Lansing Community College, where he teaches digital photography and digital imaging courses. Lea worked for newspapers early in his career and continues to be actively involved in photography, working as a freelancer and shooting running events for RunMichigan.com.

This marks Julie Price’s 25th year at the workshop. She retired in 2020 as the newspaper and yearbook adviser at Haslett High School, where she taught for 25 years. She has been involved in MIPA since the beginning of her advising career and served as a trustee, vice president, president and newspaper contest chair. Price is proud that her journalism students have stayed true to the power of having a voice and the First Amendment. Prior to teaching, Price worked 15 years as a writer and editor at newspapers in Michigan and California. She has a journalism degree from MSU.

Jim Streisel, the 2013 Dow Jones News Fund National High School Journalism Teacher of the Year, is the adviser of the Carmel (Indiana) High School HiLite newspaper. Streisel has written two journalism textbooks, “High School Journalism: A Practical Guide” and “Scholastic Web Journalism: Connecting with Readers in a Digital World.” He earned a 2012 Pioneer Award from the NSPA and was named a 2012 DJNF Distinguished Adviser. He also was named the 2011 Carmel Clay Schools Teacher of the Year and the 2011 Indiana Journalism Adviser of the Year.

Jeremy Whiting is the general manager of Michigan State University’s student-run radio station, Impact 89FM. He is the former adviser of the broadcast, yearbook and online news programs at Ovid-Elsie High School. Jeremy started at the MIPA workshop as a high school student in the late ’90s and never really left. He has previously served as president of MIPA’s board of directors.

Sara-Beth Badalamente advises the newspaper and yearbook publications at Huron High School in Ann Arbor. Badalamente, better known as “OC,” was named a winner of the American Society of News Editors’ First Amendment Challenge for innovative lesson plans on the First Amendment in 2015. She was named a JEA “Rising Star,” in 2011 and received the future journalism teacher scholarship in 2006.

Sara-Beth supervises the workshop’s curriculum, leads the response to various participant issues during the workshop and is our CFO (chief fun officer).

Jeremy Steele got his start from MIPA and now he coordinates MIPA’s conferences and contests throughout the year as the organization’s executive director. He is an academic specialist at the Michigan State University School of Journalism, where he teaches reporting and visual communication classes. Jeremy was named a 2020 Friend of Scholastic Journalism by the national Journalism Education Association. He’s sometimes joined by his trusty news hounds, Remington and Winston.

Jeremy manages the registration process for the workshop, including payments, and provides technology support to our instructors.