Cleveland High student to participate in Poetry Out Loud state finals

New Mexico Arts announced the state finals for Poetry Out Loud Monday.

Presented in partnership with the National Endowment for the Arts and the Poetry Foundation, Poetry Out Loud is a national arts education program that encourages the study of poetry by offering free educational materials and a dynamic recitation competition for high school students across the country.

On Sunday, March 3, nine high school students from across New Mexico will participate in the Poetry Out Loud state finals at St. Francis Auditorium inside the New Mexico Museum of Art in Santa Fe.

Poetry Out Loud starts in the classroom or at the local level with an area organization. Winners then may advance to a regional and/or state competition and ultimately to the national finals.

At the New Mexico finals, competitors will recite works they memorized from an anthology of more than 1,200 classic and contemporary poems. The National Endowment for the Arts and the Poetry Foundation provide free, standards-based curriculum materials — all available online — which teachers may choose to use in their classrooms. Since the program began in 2005, more than 4.3 million students and 76,000 teachers from 19,000 schools across the country have participated in Poetry Out Loud.

“We are looking forward to celebrating New Mexico’s 19th annual Poetry Out Loud state finals in Santa Fe with student competitors representing schools from across New Mexico —from Las Cruces to Montezuma, and Albuquerque to Carlsbad,” Michelle Laflamme-Childs, executive director, said. “This program, available to any high school in New Mexico, is an excellent example of how public funding for the arts provides access to arts and culture activities in communities both big and small everywhere in our great state.”

Seth McLaughlin, a student at Cleveland High School, is one of nine students who will be participating in the Poetry Out Loud New Mexico Final.

The winner of the Poetry Out Loud New Mexico finals will receive $200, and the winner’s representing school or organization will receive a $500 stipend for the purchase of poetry materials. The first runner-up will receive $100, with $200 for their representing school or organization to purchase poetry materials.

The New Mexico champion will advance to the Poetry Out Loud National Finals in Washington, D.C., in May.