(Left to right): CreComm students Andrew Parker, Dylan Hughes and Michelle Choy show off Upper Cruster, a magazine celebrating — what else? — Winnipeg's upper crust.

They've still got a year to go before graduating, but students in Red River College's Creative Communications program can already call themselves published writers.

The students — who've spent the last few months working on a term-long magazine project — showed off the fruits of their labours yesterday at the annual Creative Communications Magazine Fair.

Working in groups of three to four, students guide their magazines from inception stage to finished product — responsible for everything from articles and photographs to advertisements and marketing strategies.

"One of the reasons we have this project is that it brings together skills from a lot of different courses," says CreComm instructor Karen Press. "(Students) get to use their writing skills and their layout skills, and of course they're matching content to their audience — magazines are an especially good vehicle for targeting audiences."

This year's batch of entries included magazines devoted to Winnipeg's historic architecture, the transgendered community, coffee and tea beverages, and moving out on your own for the first time (among many others).

A panel of industry judges — among them, recent CreComm grad Jeffrey Vallis, whose SANDBOX Magazine (a co-creation with fellow CreComm-er Braden Alexander) has been making waves in local fashion circles — also weighed in on the students' work, awarding cash prizes to those deemed especially impressive.

The prizes, sponsored by the Manitoba Magazine Publishers Association, went to the teams responsible for Thingamajig (Best Overall — Ashley Wiebe, Pamela Wankling, Michael Badejo, Brian Bulos), Lomo (Best Design  — Garrick Kozier, Ryan McBride, Alex Rohne, Jordan Thompson), and Burlap (Best Content — Albertine Watson, Veronica Neufeld, Kevan Hannah, Jaremy Ediger).

Click here for more information about RRC's Creative Communications program.