Each year at our annual Homecoming Breakfast, WKU Student Publications honors two alumni who have served their careers with distinction — the College Heights Herald Award for Outstanding Contributions to Journalism and the Talisman Award for Outstanding Contributions in Communications.

We’ve been giving the Herald and Talisman awards for many years — and, in some years, several. In 2012, we started giving one Talisman and one Herald award each year.

Here are the winners through the years:

Herald Award

  • Frances Richards
  • Kelly Thompson
  • Larry Stone
  • Bill Strode
  • Bert Borrone
  • Bill ‘Whitey’ Sanders
  • L.L. Valentine
  • David B. Whitaker
  • Margaret Ann Gentry
  • Raymond C. Hornback
  • Charley Robertson
  • Ron Stuart
  • Robert Adams
  • Vernon Stone
  • Tom Patterson
  • George Wedding
  • Martin Plessinger
  • Don Collins
  • John Lucas
  • Al Cross
  • Judy Koch Ecker
  • Al Stilley
  • JoAnn Thompson
  • Virginia Wood Davis
  • Tom Caudill
  • Mary Anne Wood Thompson
  • Thomas A. George
  • Michael Morse
  • Joseph Glowacki
  • Paul Schuhmann
  • David Sutherland
  • Judy Wildman Hughes
  • Neil Budde
  • Tommy Newton
  • Jackie Bretz
  • Jim Gensheimer
  • Tom Eblen
  • David Frank
  • Robert Pope
  • Jerry Potter
  • Fran Nelson Salyers
  • Tom Yunt
  • Lynn Hoppes
  • Nikita Stewart
  • Chuck Clark
  • Steve Thomas
  • Chuck Stinnett
  • Jamie Sizemore
  • Mary C. Meehan
  • David Stephenson
  • Greg Bilbrey
  • Stephanie M. Bateman
  • Alan Judd
  • Terri Likens
  • Kristina Goetz
  • Scott Applewhite
  • Susan Wessling Mattingly
  • Amy Taylor Carter
  • Craig Dezern
  • Ryan Craig – 2012
  • Jan Diehm – 2013
  • Rick Loomis – 2014
  • John Stamper – 2015
  • Jerry Brewer – 2016
  • Chris Poore – 2017
  • Ronnie Ellis – 2018
  • Michael Collins – 2019
  • Mike Collins (posthumous) – 2020
  • Michael Casagrande – 2021
  • Ashleé Clark – 2022

Talisman Award

  • Lisa Cornwell
  • Debra Gibson
  • Margo Grace
  • Kristen Tucker
  • Vickie Bagwell
  • Donna Stinnett
  • Dwain Harris
  • Debi Wade Jordan
  • Bob Skipper
  • Tim Broekema
  • Ellen Humphries Brisendine
  • Linda Dono
  • Sandy Smith
  • Kim Kolarik
  • Epha Riche – 2012
  • Stephanie Gladney Queen – 2013
  • J. Michael Moore – 2014
  • Cheryl Edwards Martin – 2015
  • Carla and Chad Carlton – 2016
  • Brad Hughes – 2017
  • Shawntaye Hopkins – 2018
  • Kim Parson – 2019
  • Pandemic; no award – 2020
  • Carol Smith Kirves – 2021
  • Chris Poynter – 2022