For Immediate Release: March 27, 2009 Sheila Sears, sheila.sears@state.co.us, 303-892-3852 16-year-old Student Wins Poetry Out Loud State Championship Kaleena Kovach from Palmer High will compete for national title in Washington D.C.

DENVER, CO (March 27, 2009). Kaleena Kovach, a 16-year-old student from William J. Palmer High School in Colorado Springs, successfully competed for the title of Colorado State Champion of the Poetry Out Loud: National Recitation Contest. Kristina Sherman from Sand Creek High School, also in Colorado Springs, was named State Runner Up.

On March 16, students from high schools around the state participated in the fourth annual poetry contest for a chance at the Colorado state title. Represented schools were from the Denver Metro area as well as Niwot, Colorado Springs, Swink and Estes Park.

Each student recited three poems and was scored in six categories including physical presence, voice projection and articulation, overall performance, and accuracy. Participating students won the opportunity to compete at the state level after winning recitation contests at the classroom, grade, and school-wide levels.

Ms. Kovach’s winning recitations were “Somewhere to Paris” by Richard Blanco, “They are Hostile Nations” by Margaret Atwood, and “Come Up From the Fields, Father” by Walt Whitman.

When asked what poetry means to her, Ms. Kovach said, “I love poetry with all of my heart. I read and write it every chance I get and hope to major in writing in college!”

As State Champion, Ms. Kovach receives $200 and an all-expense-paid trip to Washington, D.C. next month to compete in the national finals of Poetry Out Loud. Her school receives $500 for the purchase of poetry books for the school library. The Runner Up, Ms. Sherman, will be awarded $100 and $200 for the Sand Creek High School library.

The contest is administrated by the Colorado Council on the Arts and sponsored by the national Endowment for the Arts and the Poetry Foundation. Lighthouse Writers Workshop, a Colorado non-profit organization, helped coordinate the program this year.

The Poetry Out Loud: National Recitation Contest national finals will take place on April 28th at George Washington University and features a special performance by Natalie Merchant and guest judges NPR’s Scott Simon and A Prairie Home Companion’s Garrison Keillor. A quarter of a million students from each state, the District of Columbia, the U.S. Virgin Islands, and Puerto Rico competed for a spot in this year’s national competition. 

By encouraging high school students to memorize and perform great poems, Poetry Out Loud invites the dynamic aspects of slam poetry, spoken word, and theater into the English class and helps students master public speaking skills, build self-confidence, and learn about their literary heritage.

Photographs available by request.

About the Colorado Council on the Arts:

The mission of The Colorado Council on the Arts, a division of the Office of Economic Development and International Trade, is to promote the cultural, educational, and economic growth of Colorado through development of its arts and cultural heritage. For more information, visit www.coloarts.org.