The Michigan Intercollegiate Athletic Association has announced the winners of two awards honoring outstanding publicity efforts by its member schools - the Hartman Writing Award and the Renner Associate SID Award.
Jeff Febus, sports information director at Calvin College, was named the winner of the Hartman Award, while Brent Willis, a student assistant in Alma College’s sports information office, was named the recipient of the Renner Award.
Jeff Febus
Jeff Febus, who has been sports information director at Calvin College since 1994, was honored by the MIAA for his feature story on Ben and Jon Kuiper, brothers who were members of the Calvin men’s golf team last fall. The story focused on the close ties between the brothers, both on and off the golf course.
A native of Grand Rapids, Febus is a 1992 Calvin graduate who majored in telecommunications and minored in journalism. While a student, he was a sports writer for the school's student newspaper Chimes and also served as sports director at Calvin's student television station CVN-Channel 4. As a senior in 1992, he served as the lead play-by-play broadcaster for CVN's telecast of the NCAA III Championship game in men's basketball between Calvin and the University of Rochester (NY).
Febus then earned a master's degree in journalism and mass communication from Drake University in 1994. As a Drake student, he served as a graduate assistant for the Dean of the School of Journalism and Mass Communication.
Febus returned to Calvin as the school's sports information director in time for the 1994-95 academic year. In his 16 years as Calvin's sports information director, he has covered seven Calvin teams that have captured national championships - four in men's cross country, two in women's cross country and one in men's basketball. Febus has received awards from the College Sports Information Directors Association of America (CoSIDA) for his postseason publications celebrating Calvin's national championships. In 2000, he received a CoSIDA writing award for his coverage of Calvin's national championship men's basketball team.
He has also co-produced season highlight videos of Calvin's national championship men's basketball teams in 1992 and 2000. In addition, he has served as a free-lance writer for the Grand Rapids Business Journal and for the Advance Newspapers.
Febus also oversees a crew of Calvin student workers that produce stories, statistics and photos as well as internet broadcast coverage of Calvin athletics. Febus also contributes to Calvin's audio broadcast coverage and occasionally fills in as a broadcaster of Calvin basketball games for Grand Rapids radio station WFUR-FM.
Febus is married to the former Julie Post, a 1989 Calvin graduate who was the 1988 MIAA Most Valuable Player in women's basketball. They have two sons, Jarrett and Justin.
Brent Willis
A native of Edmore, Mich., and graduate of Montabella High School, Brent Willis graduated from Alma College in May with a degree in business administration. While at Alma, he worked in the sports information office for three years under two different directors, Josh Ernst and Mike Hanson.
Willis took on a wide variety of responsibilities as an SID assistant, ranging from writing game and feature stories to lending his voice to Internet broadcasts of Alma sporting events. He handled game-day statistics for Alma basketball games for two years and took on additional game-day management responsibilities when needed.
In addition, Willis was the main game-day contact for baseball games at Klenk Park. When Alma instituted Internet broadcasts of sporting events, he started as a color commentator and eventually worked his way into doing play-by-play. He also assisted with Internet features on Alma athletes and helped complete publications such as media guides. He is cited as someone who could be trusted to complete an assignment that represented Alma in a positive manner.
Willis’ activities were not limited to working behind the scenes at Alma’s athletic events. He was a member of the Scots’ football team for four years, starting at linebacker his junior and senior years. He was third on the team in tackles in 2008 with 56 and again in 2009 with 82, including 14 tackles in back-to-back games against Hope and Trine. He led the Scots in tackles for loss in 2009 with 8.5.
Willis is presently employed as a loan servicing portfolio manager for Quadrant Financial in Indianapolis, Ind. In his role, he deals with followup details after loan closing such as construction disbursements and collections.
The awards honor two sports information directors who have given many years of service to the MIAA - Robin Hartman of Albion College and Tom Renner of Hope College. The Hartman Award honors outstanding writing in a sports information capacity, either by a sports information director or assistant, while the Renner Award honors outstanding efforts by student assistants in sports information offices at MIAA schools.
