JEA board of directors elections took place Feb. 19-26, 2024. Of the 2,442 total ballots successfully emailed, 308 members voted.
Scholastic press rights director
Andrea Negri, MJE, of Bellaire (Texas) High School, has been elected as the scholastic press rights director and will serve on the JEA board for two years starting May 1.
Negri ran uncontested and received 308 votes.
Negri advises the award-winning Carillon yearbook and teaches digital media. She is contest director for the Texas Association of Journalism Educators and secretary for the Association of Texas Photography Instructors.
Negri also serves on JEA’s certification and SPRC committees. Negri received TAJE’s Pathfinder and Trailblazer, ILPC’s Edith Fox King and JEA’s Medal of Merit awards. She is a 2022 Distinguished Yearbook Adviser.
Director-at-large
Sandra Coyer, MJE, of Puyallup (Washington) High School, has been elected as a director-at-large for a two-year term.
Coyer was one of four candidates and received 52% of the votes of the final vote using ranked-choice voting, sometimes called “instant runoff voting.”
Coyer is the director of student media at Puyallup, where she advises the Viking Vanguard newspaper, Vanguard online, the Viking yearbook and Viking Student Media broadcast channel.
She is a JEA Medal of Merit recipient and a past Washington Journalism Education Association president.
Founded in 1924, JEA supports free and responsible scholastic journalism by providing resources and educational opportunities, promoting professionalism, encouraging and rewarding student excellence and teacher achievement, and an atmosphere which encompasses diversity yet builds unity. It is headquartered at Kansas State University, Manhattan, Kansas.