Literary Magazine winners announced
Atascadero High School students submitted a total of 67 entries for the AHS Literary Magazine contest from Jan. 22 to Feb 19. There were five categories for the submissions: Short Fiction, Poetry, Creative NonFiction, Personal Narrative, and Song Lyrics.
The winners for the Creative Non-Fiction category are Jessica Jen in first place, with “Single Cell Wound Repair: Manipulating Cell Healing;” Lauren Hatfield in second place, with “Major Adversities;” and Preslee Gerber in third place, with “Religious vs. Secular Determination.”
The winners for the Personal Narrative category are Erika Mae Robledo in first place, with “Calm Before the Sun;” Ryelin Pickard in second place, with “Drowning in Emotions;” and tied for third place are Angela Enterline with “Blooming” and Julia Zielke with “Black is My Favorite Color.” Robledo said of her writing, “The main idea of this piece was the series of events I went through while visiting my mom while she was in rehab and [I] built it up until the very end.”
The winners for the Poetry category are Preslee Gerber in first place, with “Think of Me;” Delaney Rice in second place, with “Honeysuckle;” and Logan Chadwick in third place, with “Thirty-Five.” “The main idea of the poem is that everyone, including myself, contains such nuance, complexity, hidden strength, and value that rarely gets seen or acknowledged, but is truly essential to who we are,” Gerber said.
The winners for the Short Fiction category are Ashley Sutherland in first place, with “The Sheep and the Shadow;” Morgan Buffaloe in second place, with “The Thing That’s Killing Me;” and Cosette Barash in third place, with “Endless Butterflies.”
The first place winner for Song Lyrics went to Sophie Chamblin, with “One More Eternity.” “I wished that I could be in a world that didn't contain such discontent,” Chamblin said, “so I made one by writing it.”
Students were limited to submitting one entry per category. All entries had to be the student’s original and previously unpublished work and no longer than 1500 words. Each submission was scored by the Student Review Panel (SRP) first. The Editorial Board is comprised of AHS staff and administration, school district administrators, School Board members, and community members.
The winning entries are submitted to the AHS Art Department for art students to illustrate before being compiled in a digital book by Mr. Bradley's students and published in the iTunes bookstore. AP English students edit all the work before publishing.
Once the literary magazine is completed, there will be an awards reception on May 14 during Study Hall in the AHS library. “The thing I love best about the Writing Contest is how much students are able to participate and the enthusiasm they have for the program,” District librarian and literary magazine coordinator, Ms. Bell said. “From choosing categories, to reading all the entries, to advertising and illustrating and even putting it all together. It's a great opportunity for students to feel ownership over the project and gain experience in what it would take to publish a literary magazine.”