LAKEPORT — Middletown High School student Mellany Watson earned a first-place score in the Poetry Out Loud competition, which showcased three county high school students” memorization and recitation abilities on Saturday.
“The competition was very close,” Poetry Out Loud organizer Michele Krueger said. “There were only a few points between third and first place.”
Second-place winner was Jennifer Harte, also from Middletown High School. Third-place winner Rachaelanne Weiss, from Richard E. Lewis Independent Study in Konocti, was last year”s Poetry Out Loud county champion.
Saturday”s competition consisted of two rounds of dramatic recitation. The students chose from poems that had been compiled by Poetry Out Loud. “There is an anthology of 100 poems and there are 600 poems on the Web site,” Krueger told the audience.
Judges for the occasion were Mary McMillan, Lake County”s poet laureate; Sandra Wade, immediate past poet laureate; and Bert Hutt, artistic director of the Soper-Reese Community Theatre. Among criteria that the judges were instructed to look for were physical presence, vocalization and appropriateness of dramatization.
Shelby Posada, executive director of the Lake County Arts Council, tallied points awarded by the judges.
Poetry Out Loud is a recitation contest that encourages high school students to learn about great poetry through memorization and performance. The program began with competitions at participating schools. Watson and Harte tied for first place at Middletown High School”s competition, which took place earlier this year. The state finals take place March 15 in Senate Chambers in the State Capitol. The winner advances to a national competition.
Kruger, who is also affiliated with California Poets in the Schools, said she hopes to increase participation among more Lake County high schools next year. Poetry Out Loud is sponsored locally by the Lake County Arts Council. The project is funded in part by the California Arts Council and the National Endowment for the Arts.
Catfish Books and the Lake County Arts Council donated prizes that were awarded to the contestants.
For more information about Poetry Out Loud, visit www.poetryoutloud.org/ or www.cac.ca.gov/poetryoutloud/.
