Maine Poetry Out Loud

Blog post 1 of 6 – Poetry

It is very exciting to see Allan Monga, Maine’s State Poetry Out Loud (POL) 2018 champ, as the emcee of the Maine state finals this year. Unfortunately, they couldn’t be held in person but how wonderful that they’ve been recorded so you can enjoy watching and listening to students from 10 Maine high schools reciting poetry.

CONGRATULATIONS to the Maine poetry student finalists and THANK YOU TEACHERS!

EMMA COLLINS, grade 12 – North Yarmouth Academy, Teacher: Ross Markonish

HAZEL DOW, grade 11 – Waterville Senior High School, Teacher: Thomas Creeley

KATELYN NESTOR, grade 10 – Gardiner Area High School, Teacher: Melissa Cheeseman

EMILY PARUK, grade 12 – Gorham High School, Teacher: Kerry Herlihy

ZEKE SITARZ, grade 12 – Lisbon High School, Teacher: Danielle Sylvia

SOFIA STOCKWELL, grade 10 – North Haven Community School, Teacher: Matt Rich

HELEN STOUT, grade 12 – Cape Elizabeth High School, Teacher: Lisa Melanson

ROSE TUTTLE, grade 9 – Mount Ararat High School, Teacher: Emily Vail

ADA VANCIL, grade 11 – John Bapst Memorial High School, Teacher: Jennifer Babcock

MAGNOLIA VANDIVER, grade 12 – George Stevens Academy, Teacher: Maria Johnson

After three rounds of strong performances, the Maine Arts Commission POL judges announced Emily Paruk, a senior from Gorham High School, to represent Maine in May at the National POL event. Helen Strout, a senior at Cape Elizabeth High School, finished runner-up. The Maine State Finals judges were Mihku Paul, Ekhlas Ahmed, Erica Rubin Irish, and Todd McKinley. 

Emily Paruk recited Once the World Was Perfect by Joy Harjo, Fairy-tale Logic by A.E. Stallings, and [‘Often Rebuked, Yet Always Back Returning’] by Emily Bronte.

This will be the first year in the program’s 16-year history that the national competition to be held virtually. Her first appearance is May 2 at noon during one of three semifinal matches. If she advances beyond the semifinal, Paruk will compete in the national finals on May 27 at 7 p.m.

Maine’s POL program is organized by the Maine Arts Commission in partnership with the National Endowment for the Arts and the Poetry Foundation.

For more information about Maine Poetry Out Loud, visit MaineArts.com or contact Meg Fournier, Interim Director of Media and Performing Arts, Maine Arts Commission at megan.b.fournier@maine.gov. More than four million students have participated in Poetry Out Loud over the past 16 years, many advancing from classroom competitions to school competitions to state competitions to, finally, the national finals. For more information about the national POL program, visit poetryoutloud.org.

The film includes three rounds of student recitation videos, as well as performances by musicians from Maine Academy of Modern Music. Enjoy the recorded state finals below.

Poetry Out Loud Recording

Live Streamed

If you missed the Maine Poetry Out Loud (POL) State Finals that were held on Monday, March 11 you can see the BRTV recording that was live streamed. The state finals opened with the Messalonskee Jazz Band under the direction of music educator Andrew Forster.

Archived on the Maine Arts Commission Facebook page.

Joao Victor, 2019 Maine Poetry Out Loud Champion

Bill Green, who served as the emcee for the state finals, provided a POL segment on his weekend show Bill Green’s Maine News Center. It’s a wonderful summary of the event – VIEW IT HERE. Thank you Bill for doing such a great job!

The Maine Arts Commission is creating Maine videos to provide resources for students and teachers participating in the POL program. The FIRST VIDEO is available on Pace. It includes three Maine high school students, Allan Monga, Deering High School, Portland, the 2018 Maine State Champ and 1st runner-up from 2019, Emma Lombardo, Westbrook High School, a State Finalist for the 2018 and Wyatt Bates, Yarmouth High School, Regional Finalist in 2018 and 2019.  More videos will be created and all of them will be available on the Maine Arts Commission Poetry Out Loud webpage.

And, the POL Champ Is…

Congratulations

Ten students with all kinds of emotions arrived at the Waterville Opera House yesterday afternoon at about 12:30. At 2:30 the doors opened to the public and about 100 people – teachers, parents, grandparents, siblings, friends, and poets flowed into the seats for an afternoon of poetry. Everyone was excited for the State Poetry Out Loud Finals. The students were prepared, they looked great and one by one they walked onto the stage to recite poems that they had become very familiar with during the last few months.

Joao and Allan waiting to hear who would become the champ and first runner-up for 2019

At the end of the day, the ten students stood shoulder to shoulder, proud for their amazing accomplishments. One was named the 2019 Maine State POL Champion and one became the runner-up for Maine.

Congratulations to Joao Victor, grade 12, Lewiston High School, Maine’s Champ. Joao will represent Maine at the National POL Finals. Congratulations to Allan Monga, grade 12, Deering High School who was named the runner-up.

I invite you all to watch the live-stream of the national event on April 29 and May 1. More details will be provided in the future on this blog.

Joao Victor, Allan Monga, and emcee Bill Green at the end of the program

Poetry Out Loud Resources

Coming soon

Brian Evans-Jones, teaching artist and poet created a set of “exercises” that will be made available to Maine students and teachers to be used to help prepare them for the Poetry Out Loud (POL) program and for teaching and learning poetry. Recently students, poet and film makers converged on Deering High School in Portland to tape the exercises.

Maine’s 2018 POL champ Allan Monga, senior from Deering and 2018 POL state finalist Emma Lombardo, senior from Westbrook High School provided their POL experiences to demonstrate multiple recitation ideas. They are both amazing young people – I was so impressed with their thoughtfulness during the taping.

Brian directed the individual video clips, Ryan Leighton, Maine Arts Commission marketing & communications director and film maker Cody Mitchell taped hours of footage. It will be edited to create a set of resource videos that will be made available at the beginning of December 2018.

This is an amazing opportunity for Maine! It was great to see the learning taking place for all involved. Thank you to Deering High School principal Gregg Palmer for making the arrangements at the school.

ECET2 Spot On!

Gathering at Colby College

The ECET2 – Elevating and Celebrating Effective Teachers – conference held last week at Colby College was outstanding. ECET2 Maine is an educator community and two-day event and based on the ECET2 national model offering a unique opportunity for teachers from across Maine to connect with other practitioners to gain leadership skills, share innovative classroom practices, and be “celebrated” for their work on behalf of Maine’s students.

Allan Monga speaking with Sydney Chaffee

There were three Cultivating the Calling speeches that provided seeds of inspiration. Hearing educators stories is motivating and validating. One was provided by the 2017 National Teacher of the Year, Sydney Chaffee. She has been moved by her own students stories and by Maine’s Poetry Out Loud champ Allan Monga.

The breakout sessions were terrific, presented by thoughtful educators sharing their ideas and practices. The Colleague Circles provided time to discuss challenges and successes and it was made clear that we share so much across our state in schools/districts.

Colleague Circle presentations during Gallery Walk

Participants could add their “Why I Teach” to a wall and I’ve included some of them in this blog post. You can see that the arts were well represented.

The conference closed out with a Shark Tank where three teams pitched their ideas. Five hundred dollars was given to the most convincing idea which was decided by participants votes on Twitter. And, of course, the door prizes were super!

A great big thank you to the planners – once again they did an outstanding job providing an opportunity that was “spot on” for educators!

There were at least 5 participants who said they will be working on having an ECET2 event in their communities. Watch for the information as it becomes available on their website or Facebook.

So Proud of Allan!

Poetry Out Loud

National POL, 2018

Today started early by boarding a plane in Washington, D.C. to return to Maine after attending the National Poetry Out Loud National Finals held at the Lisner Auditorium at George Washington University. The Poetry Out Loud program is a partnership of the Poetry Foundation and the National Endowment for the Arts. It is administered in each state by the state arts agencies. In our case, the Maine Arts Commission. Over 9,500 students participated this year from 39 high schools across the state.

 

Allan reciting at the state, March 20, Waterville Opera House

Representing Maine this year at the national event was Allan Monga from Deering High School. Students were divided by region during the semi-finals – 3 events – on Tuesday with the northeast region taking place in the morning. Allan did a fabulous job representing Maine – we can all be very proud! The student named national champ for 2018, Janae Claxton, attends the First Baptist Church High School in Charleston, South Carolina.

As I drove home thinking about the last three days, I kept wondering how satisfied each student must feel after several months of preparing for their recitations. Every young person there really leaned in, some surprising themselves, and achieving at a high level. They were an impressive group!

Maine POL coordinator Don Reutershan, Maine POL Champ Allan Monga, and MAC Arts Education Director Argy Nestor

Find Allan’s interview with All Things Considered from Tuesday, April 24 at “https://www.npr.org/player/embed/605260963/605401512” 

In Today’s News

Allan Monga going to D.C. for POL

Allan Monga, a Deering High School student from Zambia, will be representing Maine next week at the National Poetry Out Loud competition. READ the entire article from the Portland Press Herald (April 20) written by Ray Routhier.

Bangor Daily News article (April 21) written by Judy Harrison. READ the article.

 

Poetry Out Loud Finalists

Yahoooo for high school students and poetry

State Final, Free and Open to Public, at Waterville Opera House March 14

AUGUSTA, ME–The art of performance and spoken word is alive and well in Maine high schools, as 39 individual students competed in two Poetry Out Loud Regional Finals last month.  The Maine Arts Commission, which administers the poetry competition at the state level, is pleased to announce the top 10 finalists who will compete in state finals at the Waterville Opera House on March 14 at 3:00 p.m.

Congratulations to the following finalists:

Northern Maine Regional Champions: The northern regional poetry recitation contest final was hosted by Hampden Academy.

• Lydia Caron, Grade 12, Bangor High School
• Katherine Kemper, Grade 12, Camden Hills Regional High School
• Lauren Dodge, Grade 12, Lee Academy
• Hannah Lavenson, Grade 12, Messalonskee High School
• Lauren Farmer, Grade 10, Rangeley Lakes Regional Schools

Southern Maine Regional Champions: The southern regional final was hosted by Westbrook Middle School.

• Allan Monga, Grade 11, Deering High School
• Abbie vanLuling, Grade 12, Gorham High School
• Richard Hilscher , Grade 12, North Yarmouth Academy
• Emma Lombardo, Grade 11, Westbrook High School
• Wyatt Bates, Grade 11, Yarmouth High School

After three rounds of competition, one state finalist will be named the overall winner and advance to the national competition, where s/he will compete for a total of $50,000 in awards and school stipends, as well as a $20,000 scholarship.

The Maine Poetry Out Loud state finals are March 14 at the Waterville Opera House. The doors will open at 2:30 p.m. for a 3 p.m. performance start. The event is free and open to the public, who are encouraged to attend. It will also be broadcast and streamed live throughout Maine in collaboration with Boothbay Region Television on the BRTV station and through Facebook Live.

For more information about the state and national finals, please visit Maine Arts Commission: Poetry Out Loud 2017 or contact Argy Nestor, Maine Arts Commission Director of Arts Education at argy.nestor@maine.gov or 207-287-2713.