KCM would like to congratulate Ainsley Trunkhill, from Hutchinson Community College, on being named the two-year college Journalist of the Year. Ainsley is a sophomore from Hutchinson who had no journalism experience before the fall semester, but she decided to join The Hutchinson Collegian staff almost on a whim. In the fall semester, three months after graduating high school, Ainsley wrote stories on the rising number of book challenges and bans nationwide; a HutchCC student from Brazil who had no means of getting to Hutchinson after flying to Wichita, and ended up buying a bicycle from Walmart to navigate back roads and dirt roads to get to his new home; and a story on a man in prison for attempted murder, who is taking online classes at HutchCC and helped organize a chess club that has gone international.
Laci Sutton, also from from Hutchinson Community College, is the 2023 first runner-up for two-year college Journalist of the Year.