PRESS RELEASE
For Immediate Release
The Arts Council
Contact: Kevin Ledgewood
(205) 758-5195, x6
2011 POETRY OUT LOUD – DISTRICT 3 WINNERS ANNOUNCED
(Tuscaloosa) The Arts Council recently hosted the District 3 Poetry Out Loud regional finals competition featuring local high school students in the West-Central Alabama area. Prior to the round in Tuscaloosa on November 29, the students participated in a primary competition at their respective high schools.
Contestants competed in both a phase requiring the recitation of memorized poetry and one in which they recited their own original compositions. Traveling to Montgomery, AL in 2012, the winners in both the recitation and original poetry portions will compete in the state-wide competition. Winners in the recitation portion will then have the opportunity to travel to Washington, D.C. for a final round. Sponsors include the National Endowment for the Arts, Poetry Foundation, Alabama State Council on the Arts and The Arts Council.
Anthology (National)
Ellen Grappe Holy Spirit High School
Christina Morris Montevallo High School
Original (State)
Pierce Goodbread Holy Spirit High School
Ian Lee Montevallo High School
Judges for the day were John Paul Taylor, Executive Director for Real Life Poets, Inc.; Abraham Smith, MFA, Instructor at The University of Alabama; and Patti White, PhD, Professor of English, The Slash Pine Projects at The University of Alabama. Ashley Gorham, MFA Candidate, English Department at The University of Alabama, served as Accuracy Judge and Kevin Ledgewood, Arts Council Publicist, was Prompter. Sharron Rudowski, Director of Educational Programs for The Arts Council, was the coordinator of the event for District 3.
The District 3 participants’ original poetry will be featured in a Slash Pine Press publication to be released in 2011. Slash Pine Press, based at The University of Alabama, produces limited-run chapbooks of poetry and other mixed-genre works, and occasionally hosts off-the-beaten-path reading events, including the Slash Pine Poetry Festival held at the end of April. Through this program, undergraduate students conceive and execute their own notions of book design, imagine and locate their own spaces for engaged performance, and form and upload their own versions of a relevant internet presence.
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