“We had a wonderful staff last year,” said editor-in-chief Katy Bolesta. “There were a lot of freshmen on staff who came in with experience from high school, so they were able to generate a lot of the new ideas that made the yearbook as special as it was.”

“All Wrapped Up,” the winning theme for last year’s yearbook, was designed to resemble a package stamped special delivery for Temple’s 2005 graduating class.

The 2005 edition veered from tradition by doubling the number of color pictures pages, which included images of campus life and events, Bolesta said.

Templar was one of six yearbooks from universities with enrollments of 2,501 and above that won a first place award. Other winning yearbooks include the Epitome published by Lehigh University, Lance published by Gannon University and Le Souvenir published by students at Southeastern Louisiana University.

Each year, a staff of 15 designers, photographers and planners spend an entire academic year working to perfect the yearbook.

Final planning for the 2006 edition of Templar is under way, said Bolesta, a junior majoring in magazine journalism in the School of Communication and Theater.

“The 2006 theme is ‘Growing into Greatness,’” she said. “We’ve done a few new things with sections, and personal interviews from students. I’m really excited about the design of this yearbook.”