I am pleased to announce that my student, Madison Stingray, has won a gold medal for California for her short story through the Scholastic Artists and Writers contest. Her story will now be sent on for the national competition and if she wins, then she and I will travel to Carnegie Hall for a celebration of all the award-winning artists and writers in grades 7 – 12 throughout the United States. Maddie and I have been to Carnegie Hall once before for her writing and we both received awards: her for her short story and me for being a nationally recognized writing teacher.

The Scholastic Writing and Artist contest is the oldest and most prestigious writing and art contest for youth in grades 7 – 12 in the country. Former winners include Truman Capote, Joyce Carol Oates, Richard Avedon, and Robert Redford.

Tony Kushner, the author of Angels in America and Lincoln, was the keynote speaker the last time we went to Carnegie Hall. It was thrilling and inspirational.

We only hope Madison wins at national and gets to make that trek to NYC; however, her gold medal for California is extremely impressive in itself. This state has so much writing talent it results in stiff competition. Needless to say, I am delighted for Madison. Her story deserves the recognition it’s getting. It’s excellent.

We will learn in mid-February which of my other students won silver and bronze medals. We have just learned of the gold medal winners in the past couple of days.

Congratulations to Madison. You have outshone yourself with this particular story.

Fingers remain crossed for all my other students and their outstanding work. Now we just have to wait to hear the rest of the results.