Congratulations to PCA&M Virtual Poetry Out Loud Regional Winner
Pittsburgh Center for Arts and Media (PCA&M) proudly announces the winner of our 2021 Virtual Regional Competition for Poetry Out Loud: National Recitation Contest, Lily Weatherford-Brown, who is a senior at Pittsburgh CAPA 6-12.
At Pennsylvania’s Virtual State Competition, Ms. Weatherford-Brown will be competing with 13 other high school students from across the Commonwealth, with the winner to be announced at noon on March 9, 2021. Ms. Weatherford-Brown was also PCA&M’s regional winner in 2020.
The virtual competition, presented in partnership with the PA Council on the Arts, the National Endowment for the Arts, and the Poetry Foundation, is part of a national program that encourages high school students to learn about great poetry through memorization, performance, and competition. In February 2021 three high school students, junior Shaiane M. Matotek from Lincoln Park Performing Arts Charter School, freshman Marlo Cyanovich from Montour High School, and Ms. Weatherford-Brown, participated in PCA&M’s 2021 Virtual Regional Poetry Out Loud Competition.
Ms. Weatherford-Brown is a senior in the Literary Arts Department at Pittsburgh CAPA. She is a Youth Poet Ambassador of Allegheny County and an avid reader and writer both in and out of school. She hopes to pursue creative writing and especially poetry in college.
We were honored to have five volunteer judges contribute their time, talents, and passion for poetry to our competition this year: poet and Prosody sound engineer Lisa Alexander; writer/poet/teacher/artist Sarah Leavens; poet/writer/teaching artist Lucia LoTempio; writer Emily Stedge; and artist/Duolingo manager Elise Walton. Our dedicated judges have contributed their talents and passions for poetry for many years: Ms. Leavens and Ms. Walton since 2013, Ms. Alexander since 2015, and Ms. Stedge and Ms. LoTempio since 2020. Ms. Leavens and Ms. LoTempio both work with PCA&M as Teaching Artists, and Ms. Stedge is our Education Coordinator.
Poetry Out Loud is a national arts education program that encourages the study of great poetry by offering educational materials and a dynamic recitation competition to high schools and community organizations across the country. Poetry Out Loud uses a pyramid structure. Beginning at the classroom level, winners advance to a school-wide competition, then to a regional competition, then to a state competition, and ultimately to the National Semifinals and Finals. 2021 is the sixteenth year of Poetry Out Loud.