News

Local students win state writing awards

By Bill Moss, Published: September 3, 2015

Students from Hendersonville High School and Hendersonville Middle School have won first place honors in statewide poetry and literature contests.

Louise Cummins, a freshman at Hendersonville High, and Erin Price, an eighth-grader at Hendersonville Middle, won first place in their respective divisions of the N.C. Poet Laureate Writing Contest and the N.C. Letters About Literature Contest over the summer.

Cummins’ poem, “Marigold,” won first place in the grades 6-8 division of the N.C. Poet Laureate Writing Contest, sponsored by the N.C. English Teachers Association. Cummins will be recognized by N.C. Poet Laureate Shelby Stephenson at the NCETA 2015 state conference in October. “Marigold” will be published on the N.C. Arts Council and NCETA websites, and Cummins will receive a $250 prize.

Price’s letter to Rebecca Stead, author of “When You Reach Me,” won first place in the grades 7-8 division of the N.C. Letters About Literature Contest. Sponsored by the Library of Congress and the State Library of North Carolina, the contest invites students in grades 4 through 12 to write letters to authors whose work has impacted them. Price’s letter was among 1,600 entries from North Carolina and 52,000 nationwide, and is currently published on the State Library of North Carolina’s website.

Both Cummins and Price will be recognized at the Henderson County School Board meeting on Sept. 14.