Unity Through Diversity Week essay and poster contest winners were announced yesterday at a ceremony in Sandburg Auditorium.

Anne Kaplan, assistant to NIU President John LaTourette, awarded a compact disc player to Tracy Deis, a freshman majoring in elementary education, for her first-place essay.

James DeYoung, a visual and performing arts major, received $250 for his first-prize poster. DeYoung was not present to receive his award.

Second and third prizes in the essay contest went to Hertha Valiente and Jane Nededog, who received $100 and $50 cash prizes respectively.

Paul Ross’ poster entry won the second prize of $100. A $25 gift certificate was awarded to Kevin DeNardo for third place.

Seven honorable mentions in the essay contest were given to Jo Ferguson, Robert Grimes, Daniel Homeier, Rachel Horn, Joseph Pierce, Lynn Rogers and Tammy Tyree.

Winners of the poster contest honorable mentions include Carlos Amaury, Roger Boecher, Dennis Delop, Erik Engel, Mike Flanagan, Deinna Gannon, Chuck Gniech, Jr., Patrick Gutney and Pamela McCallister.

Poster Committee Chairman Van Amos thanked the local businesses for donating the prizes.

Katz-Mason donated the first prize for the poster contest. The second and the third prizes came from Pizza Villa, 824 W. Lincoln Hwy., and the Holmes Student Center Bookstore respectively.

Audio Plus, 866 W. Lincoln Hwy., American National Bank of DeKalb and Hallgren Lumber Co., 1205 E. Locust, contributed the first, second and third prizes for the essay contest respectively.

Student Housing Assistant Director Stacey Dolby, one of the five poster contest judges, said some of the posters were very well done.

Posters were judged on the basis of closeness to the theme of the awareness week, creativity, originality and reproducibility, he said.

Dolby said the winning poster will be reproduced by the NIU Foundation and will be displayed all over the campus throughout the year.

Essay Contest Committee Chairwoman Laura Frankiewicz said universality and simplicity of the message were the criteria to evaluate the winning essays out of the 58 entries.

Deis said her article concerned the different constituents of society.

Valiente said, “I am very happy. I learned a lot while I was writing the article.”