The National Endowment for the Arts today announced that Jennifer Shon, an 11th-grade student at Portsmouth Abbey School in Portsmouth, Rhode Island, won the 2024 Poetry Ourselves spoken word competition for her original poem, “My Hanbando” on Thursday, May 2
Poetry Ourselves is an optional competition for state champions competing at the Poetry Out Loud National Finals.
The students can showcase their creativity by submitting an original work of poetry in one of two categories: a written poem or a video of a spoken poem, both of which were judged by poet José Olivarez and announced at last night’s National Finals.
Shon represented Rhode Island in Washington, D.C., for the 2024 Poetry Out Loud National Finals, April 30-May 2. In March, Shon won the 19th R.I. Poetry Out Loud State Championship with the “Say Grace” recitation by Emily Jungmin Yoon.
At the Poetry Out Loud championships in Washington, D.C., Shon joined state winners nationwide to compete in regional semifinals.
Sreepadaarchana Munjuluri, a junior at Columbus North High School in Indiana, is the 2023 Poetry Out Loud National Champion. The 2nd place winner is Edward Wilson Jr., a senior at Jackson Preparatory School in Mississippi, and Madison Harris, a freshman at Indian Creek School in Crownsville, Maryland took 3rd place.
On March 10, 14 R.I. high school students, representing schools from around the state, competed in the state’s Poetry Out Loud competition at the Greenwich Odeum. Prior to the competition, competitors spent most of the school year studying poetry through learning, memorization, and performance.
Portsmouth Abbey School junior to travel to Washington, D.C., to compete in the Poetry Out Loud Finals
Portsmouth Abbey Student wins Poetry Out Loud R.I. contest
Congrats! Can we know more about this young woman? And the poem? Need more details!