Fresno County High School Students Compete in Poetry Out Loud at City Hall

Poetry Out Loud, a partnership between the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) and The Poetry Foundation, is an annual national poetry recitation contest with county and state competitions preceding National Finals California Arts Council facilitates and sponsors these county competitions and hosts each year’s California state contest

This year, Fresno County’s competition was held in Fresno City Council Chambers at Fresno City Hall on Wednesday, February 8th Seventeen students from five local high schools Washington Union High School, San Joaquin Memorial High School, Clovis West High School, Endeavor Charter, and Roosevelt High School performed poems chosen from the Poetry Out Loud database Students selected, memorized, and rehearsed poems with guidance from their teachers, Carlie Frye and Joseph Olivares (SJMHS), Kolab Vuong (WUHS), Erin Garcia (CWHS), and Susie Shaw (Endeavor) Writers and educators, Megan Anderson Bohigian, Steven Sanchez, and Gabi Cruz-Brittsan, served as judges, adhering to Poetry Out Loud’s scoring criteria and guidance

Each participant received a certificate of achievement and monetary awards were presented to the top three scorers Alejandro Kitchener Morales (RHS) was second runner-up for his performances of “Invisible Children” by Maria Llanos and "Jaguar" by Francisco x Alarcón Michael Trahan (SJMHS) was runner-up with “The Road Not Taken” by Robert Frost and "The Days Gone By" by James Whitcomb Riley, and first prize went to Aaron Santibanz-Ramirez (CWHS) for his recitations of “Friendship After Love” by Ella Wheeler Wilcox and "Onions" by William Matthews

Aaron Santibanez-Ramirez advanced to California’s virtual Poetry Out Loud competition, held March 7 State finals are normally held at the Capitol in Sacramento, but were conducted virtually this year SantibanezRamirez submitted three distinct video recitations, as well as an original composition in the Poetry Ourselves writing competition, available only to County winners

The California Arts Council will host an in-person celebration in Sacramento on May 15-16 for all Poetry Out Loud County Champions Though Santibanez did not place in the statewide competition, he said, "this whole thing is amazing and it’s very fascinating that all of this fun came out of me just taking a leap of faith and committing to the county competition!"

National semi-finals and finals were held in Washington D C and virtually streamed May 9-10 Sreepadaarchana Munjuluri of Indiana won the National contest, and a prize of $20,000 Congratulations to all of our Fresno County students who participated, and thank you to their teachers, coaches, and judges who volunteered their time to make this event a success If you are interested in bringing Poetry Out Loud to your high school or volunteering as a coach or judge, please reach out to Program Coordinator, Andrea Mele at andrea@fresnoartscouncil org

Photos, clockwise from top left:

Washington Union HS students before the competition; participants gather with their certificates; San Joaquin Memorial HS students and their teachers; top three POL finalists; Clovis West HS participants and their teachers; Endeavor Charter students; County Champion, Aaron Santibanez Ramirez