We want to thank the many young writers in the Pittsburgh region who submitted work to the 2018 Pittsburgh Regional Scholastic Writing Competition. We truly appreciate your work, as well as that of the many inspiring teachers who support youth writing. The over 400 submissions received this year reflect the vibrant breadth of youth writing in Allegheny County.
National Award Winners
Brianna Kline Costa, Grade 10, Final Prayers, Gold Medal, Poetry
Chelsea Lewis, Grade 12, Manifesto of Blackness, Silver Medal with Distinction, Writing Portfolio
Zehra Mehdi, Grade 10, Come Back to Ya Mama, Son, Silver Medal, Poetry
Faith Nguyen, Grade 9, Paper Stars and Folding Hands, Gold Medal, Poetry
Christopher Rodes, Grade 10, “People Without Number, But Nothing of Importance”: Early European Encounters With Indigenous Cultures, Silver Medal, Critical Essay
Iris Roth-Bamberg, Grade 8, Scholastic Poetry, Silver Medal, Poetry
Ciara Sing, Grade 12, For The Black Boys That Never Learned How To Swim, Gold Medal, Poetry
Amelia Staresinic, Grade 7, Flight: The Story of a Small Girl with Big Dreams, Silver Medal, Dramatic Script
Emily Weiss, Grade 12, Androgynous: A More Complete Definition, Gold Medal, Flash Fiction
Serena Zets, Grade 12, For the Love of God, Silver Medal, Writing Portfolio
Pittsburgh Regional Awards
American Voices Nominees
Makayla Wach, Grade 9, North Allegheny Intermediate School, Short Story for “Apology Letter”
Kyla Parker, Grade 11, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Humor for “Just Mary”
Corinne Swan, Grade 11, North Allegheny Senior High School, Science Fiction/Fantasy for “Cash, Credit, or Memories”
Ciara Sing, Grade 12, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Poetry for “For The Black Boys That Never Learned How To Swim”
Ciara Sing, Grade 12, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Poetry for “Mother’s Morning Prayer”
Senior Writing Portfolios
Tess Christensen, North Allegheny Senior High School, Honorable Mention for “Bedtime Stories (And Other Things Too)”
Lily Wang, Franklin Regional Senior High School, Honorable Mention for “Show and Tell”
Emily Weiss, Shady Side Academy Senior School, Honorable Mention for “Allegorical Interest”
Noor El-Dehaibi, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Silver Key for “Love and Reparation”
Blaine Frank, Gateway Senior High School, Silver Key for “Which Witch is Which”
Will Thayer, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Silver Key for “The End of the World Circus”
Chelsea Lewis, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Gold Key for “Manifesto of Blackness”
Ciara Sing, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Gold Key for “Many Thousand Gone”
Serena Zets, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Gold Key for “For the Love of God”
Grade Seven
Dramatic Script
Chaynee White, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Honorable Mention for “Night at the Zoo”
Amelia Staresinic, Pittsburgh CAPA Schoo, Gold Key for “Flight: The Story of a Small Girl with Big Dreams”
Poetry
Christina Campbell, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Honorable Mention for “This is the Place”
Delaney DeVault, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Honorable Mention for “Watching Window”
Ella Engberg, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Honorable Mention for “Pluviophile”
Lena Carson, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Silver Key for “Eight Ways of Looking at Water, Tree of Knowledge”
Grace Glowczewski, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Silver Key for “7 Ways of Looking at a Bicycle”
Short Story
Markella Jahn, Ft. Couch Middle School, Silver Key for “The Wish”
Grade Eight
Personal Essay/Memoir
Himani Karia, Ft. Couch Middle School, Honorable Mention for “Battle of Ambivalence”
Elise Silvestri, Pittsburgh Sterrett Academy, Honorable Mention for “A Sober Experience”
Poetry
Neila McElfresh, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Honorable Mention for “Sweat and Blood and Tears, Hopscotch”
Oliver Moore, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Honorable Mention for “Insomnia”
Josephine Reiter, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Honorable Mention for “A Snapshot, More Colors, The Erasing”
Julia Roeschenthaler, Ft. Couch Middle School, Honorable Mention for “Time”
Emerson Davis-Martin, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Silver Key for “Firework, Dirty Hands and Skinned Knees, I See You”
Shelley Demus, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Silver Key for “Code Red, River Boy, and Deck of Cards”
Julia Roeschenthaler, Ft. Couch Middle School, Silver Key for “The Significance of Man”
Molly Figas, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Gold Key for “What we choose to forget, Differences, Tomorrow at Phillies”
Iris Roth-Bamberg, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Gold Key for “Death’s Court, Garbage Graveyard, The Warning, Asteroid”
Short Story
Elise Silvestri, Pittsbrugh Sterrett Academy, Honorable Mention for “Zero Gravity”
Grade Nine
Critical Essay
Simone Rothstein, Ellis School, Honorable Mention for “The Benefits and Constraints of Gender Roles”
Personal Essay/Memoir
Amy Yu, Shady Side Academy Senior School, Honorable Mention for “Home vs. jia”
Aditya Menon, Sewickley Academy, Silver Key for “An Afternoon in Thrissur”
Claire Shao, North Allegheny Intermediate School, Gold Key for “Katherine Johnson”
Poetry
Allison Carey, Fox Chapel Area High School, Honorable Mention for “Trail Ride”
Danielle Jordan, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Honorable Mention for “The Ocean”
Makenna Katarski, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Honorable Mention for “Appetite”
Natalie Kocherzat, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Honorable Mention for “Writing in Autumn”
Makayla Wach, North Allegheny Intermediate School, Honorable Mention for “Dear Dad”
Tanya Babbar, Pine-Richland High School, Silver Key for “Only the Children Can See Tree Tops”
Annika Chaves, Upper St. Clair High School, Silver Key for “An Unwanted Question”
Azriah Crawley, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Silver Key for “Patriotic”
Alison Harvill, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Silver Key for “Can You Tell I’m Lying?”
Amara Ostroff, Fox Chapel Area High School, Silver Key for “He Lied.”
Lily Weatherford-Brown, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Silver Key for “Earth Has Problems so Big You Can’t Remember Your Own”
Faith Nguyen, North Allegheny Intermediate School, Gold Key for “Paper Stars and Folding Hands”
Short Story
Meredith Blough, North Allegheny Intermediate School, Honorable Mention for “The Ninth of Each Month”
Elizabeth Stenson, Winchester Thurston School, Honorable Mention for “The Trials of Humanity”
Makayla Wach, North Allegheny Intermediate School, Gold Key and American Voices Nomination for “Apology Letter”
Grade Ten
Critical Essay
Rivers Leche, Winchester Thurston School, Honorable Mention for “The Multifaceted Intricacies of She Walks in Beauty by Lord Byron”
Julia Lombardi, Baldwin Senior High School, Honorable Mention for “War is No Celebration”
Mim Ritz, Ellis School, Honorable Mention for “A Modern Vindication of Korean Female Idols”
Zoe Soteres, Winchester Thurston School, Honorable Mention for “The Misconceptions of Honor Killing”
Aniya Akhtar, Ellis School, Silver Key for “Women in the Eyes of the Justice System”
Rebekah Froehlich, North Hills Senior High School, Silver Key for “The Liability of Man”
Christopher Rodes, Home School, Gold Key for “‘People Without Number, But Nothing of Importance’: Early European Encounters With Indigenous Cultures”
Eleanor Rodes, Home School, Gold Key for “The New England Journey Home”
Flash Fiction
Margaret Balich, Winchester Thurston School, Honorable Mention for “Not Just Dust”
Christopher Rodes, Home School, Honorable Mention for “Evening Ritual”
Christopher Rodes, Home School, Silver Key for “Makena Beach”
Zehra Mehdi, North Allegheny Intermediate School, Gold Key for “Not My Life”
Novel Writing
Brianna Kline Costa, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Gold Key for “The Other Side of the Moon”
Personal Essay/Memoir
Sarah Besser, Upper St. Clair High School, Honorable Mention for “A Phone Call Never Placed”
Zoe Soteres, Winchester Thurston School, Honorable Mention for “Tampons: the Best Kind of Beauty Product”
Brianna Kline Costa, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Gold Key for “Thought Experiments on Closed Boxes”
Poetry
Annika Gleason, Fox Chapel Area High School, Honorable Mention for “Stars”
Brooke Hathhorn, Hampton High School, Honorable Mention for “The House”
Zehra Mehdi, North Allegheny Intermediate School, Honorable Mention for “Predators”
Zeynep Ozkaya, Fox Chapel Area High School, Honorable Mention for “Disquietude”
Christopher Rodes, Home School, Honorable Mention for “The Moment; Winter Rain”
Christopher Rodes, Home School, Honorable Mention for “Steel City”
Christopher Rodes, Home School, Honorable Mention for “Things I didn’t know I loved – after reading Nazim Hikmet”
Zoe Soteres, Winchester Thurston School, Honorable Mention for “The Childen Of…”
Zoe Soteres, Winchester Thurston School, Honorable Mention for “Princess Lightfeather”
Margaret Balich, Winchester Thurston School, Silver Key for “What You Leave Behind”
Thalia King, Pittsburgh CAPA Schoool, Silver Key for “Lipstick”
Rivers Leche, Winchester Thurston School, Silver Key for “An Appeal to America, Pause, To the Old Man on the Bus”
Mishon Levine, Sewickley Academy, Silver Key for “Reminisce These Waters, Identity Theft, If I Ever, Stains of Unwritten Stories, My Hiraeth”
Margaret Balich, Winchester Thurston School, Gold Key for “I Miss You When It’s Quiet”
Rebekah Froehlich, North Hills Senior High School, Gold Key for “A Modern Love Story”
Brianna Kline Costa, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Gold Key for “Final Prayers”
Zehra Mehdi, North Allegheny Intermediate School, Gold Key for “Come Back to Ya Mama, Son”
Science Fiction/Fantasy
Marie Kaminski, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Honorable Mention for “Cain’s Curse”
Gwendolyn Davison, Fox Chapel Area High School, Silver Key for “The Hollow”
Nicole Shigiltchoff, Winchester Thurston School, Silver Key for “Charlotte and The Freak Cafe, or, The Night Magic”
Short Story
Maddie Figas, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Honorable Mention for “Grapes in the Sky”
Elizabeth Kuhn, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Honorable Mention for “How to Repot a Plant”
Zeynep Ozkaya, Fox Chapel Area High School, Honorable Mention for “The Repentance of Memory”
Tara Stenger, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Honorable Mention for “Rush Hour”
Esmeralda Bessor-Foreman, Winchester Thurston School, Silver Key for “Storm Girls”
Ilan Magnani, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Silver Key for “Felt Tip Sacrilege”
Grade Eleven
Critical Essay
Nick Sawicki, Shady Side Academy Senior School, Honorable Mention for “Required Current Events Course: Why It’s Needed in High Schools and How to Implement It”
Nick Sawicki, Shady Side Academy Senior School, Gold Key for “Why Colleges Should Not Use Affirmative Action”
Linsey Szabo, Sewickley Academy, Gold Key for “Light and Dark”
Meredith Warden, Winchester Thurston School, Gold Key for “The Impossibility of the American Dream in Literature”
Dramatic Script
Lillian Hosken, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Honorable Mention for “Ouija Rap Legend”
Ellen Poplavska, North Allegheny Senior High School, Silver Key for “Christmas, Somewhere”
Humor
Maddie Katarski, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Honorable Mention for “The Vamp is in”
Jenna Moretti, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Honorable Mention for “Stop at the Money”
Corinne Swann, North Allegheny Senior High School, Honorable Mention for “When Board Games Go Horribly Wrong”
Madeline Bain, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Silver Key for “The Ugly Son”
Kyla Parker, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Gold Key and American Voices Nomination for “Just Mary”
Journalism
Nick Sawicki, Shady Side Academy Senior School, Honorable Mention for “The Human Engineering and Research Lab of Pittsburgh”
Personal Essay/Memoir
Katarina Mondor, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Honorable Mention for “The Case of the Crush”
Kate Chaillet, Winchester Thurston School, Silver Key for “One Plus One”
Rachael Harris, North Allgeheny Senior High School, Silver Key for “Satisfaction”
Corinne Swann, North Allegheny Senior High School, Silver Key for “The ‘New’ Normal”
Zihe Tian, Winchester Thurston School, Silver Key for “From the very Beginning”
Amanda Lu, North Allegheny Senior High School, Gold Key for “memoirs of an American-born Chinese”
Poetry
Maya Berardi, Avonworth High School, Honorable Mention for “plink plink”
Djibril Branche, Shday Side Academy Senior School, Honorable Mention for “Sincerely, me, Pathologies Laden in Expressive Frogs in Silver Tongues, At Least It was Here”
Tess Buchanan, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Honorable Mention for “Iris”
Margaret Fletcher, Fox Chapel Area High School, Honorable Mention for “Love Painted Yellow”
Evie Jin, Winchester Thurston School, Honorable Mention for “do you remember when we used to”
Nadine Oury, Winchester Thurston School, Honorable Mention for “Dear Dragon Blood Tree”
Kyah Russell, Gateway Senior High School, Honorable Mention for “Empty Thoughts from an Angsty Teen”
Hazel Shanks, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Honorable Mention for “Bridge Locks”
Corinne Swann, North Allegheny Senior High School, Honorable Mention for “The Fair Prince”
Jimmy Coblin, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Silver Key for “The Day The World Ended”
Margaret Fletcher, Fox Chapel Area High School, Silver Key for “Learning to Swim”
Eliana Gagnon, Shady Side Academy Senior School, Silver Key for “Stage Fright”
Emma Kazmierczak, Fox Chapel Area High School, Silver Key for “Alive”
Riley Moore, Pine-Richland High School, Silver Key for “Nosebleeds”
Amanda Wolf, Mt. Lebanon High School, Gold Key for “Skaters”
Roshie Xing, North Allegheny Senior High School, Gold Key for “Again”
Science Fiction/Fantasy
Bailey Landis, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Silver Key for “Tracking The Wolves”
Corinne Swann, North Allegheny Senior High School, Gold Key and American Voices Nomination for “Cash, Credit, or Memories”
Short Story
Evie Jin, Winchester Thurston School, Honorable Mention for “If We Were Young”
Maddie Katarski, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Honorable Mention for “The Waterboy”
Riley Moore, Pine-Richland High School, Honorable Mention for “Shoot”
Eve Jin, Winchester Thurston School, Silver Key for “When The Light is Gone”
Nisha Rao, North Allegheny Senior High School, Silver Key for “A Life in Water”
Evie Jin, Winchester Thurston School, Gold Key for “The Keeper”
Grade Twelve
Critical Essay
Jaya Alagar, Home School, Honorable Mention for “A Tale of Two Social Classes”
Emily Weiss, Shady Side Academy Senior School, Honorable Mention for “Revenge is the Best Success”
Jaya Alagar, Home School, Silver Key for “Jane Eyre: Echoes of the Author in the Protagonist”
Dramatic Script
Will Thayer, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Honorable Mention for “Blackheads”
Noor El-Dehaibi, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Silver Key for “Most Livable”
Flash Fiction
Noor El-Dehaibi, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Honorable Mention for “The Hunger—A Mini Novel”
Blaine Frank, Gateway Senior High School, Silver Key for “When We Fell”
Emily Weiss, Shady Side Academy Senior School, Gold Key for “Androgynous: A More Complete Definition”
Humor
Claudia Simon, Fox Chapel Area High School, Silver Key for “Frogs In Culture”
Journalism
Chelsea Carver, Pine-Richland High School, Silver Key for “Mobile Devices Take a Toll on Health”
Novel Writing
Suzen Richardson, Propel Braddock Hills High School, Honorable Mention for “Writing is My Passion”
Personal Essay/Memoir
Jaya Alagar, Home School, Honorable Mention for “Recipes and Realizations”
Leah Blackwell, Moon Area High School, Honorable Mention for “Behind the Plus Sign”
Natalie Christel, Pine-Richland High School, Honorable Mention for “Here and Everywhere through Social Media”
Will Thayer, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Honorable Mention for “Bones Below the Mulch”
Will Thayer, Pittsbrugh CAPA School, Honorable Mention for “Things I See When I Look at My Wrists”
Serena Zets, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Honorable Mention for “Home”
Ciara Sing, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Gold Key for “A Pop Quiz to Make Myself Even More Confused About Identity”
Poetry
Tess Christensen, North Allegheny Senior High School, Honorable Mention for “Poems About Some Things But Not Other Things”
Noor El-Dehaibi, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Honorable Mention for “Soft as She Is”
Aliza Hamid, Gateway Senior High School, Honorable Mention for “An American Dream: A Collection of Poems”
Emily Pollock, Winchester Thurston School, Honorable Mention for “Eulogy”
Will Thayer, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Honorable Mention for “Craniotomy on White Coconut”
Will Thayer, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Honorable Mention for “California”
Noor El-Dehaibi, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Silver Key for “Extended Form on Bushisms”
Cara Levicoff, Fox Chapel Area High School, Silver Key for “Our Last Night”
Jake Linder, South Park High School, Silver Key for “I Passed Our Diner”
Camille Traczek, North Hills Senior High School, Silver Key for “A Collection of Whens”
Ciara Sing, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Gold Key for “the lead bullet hit/”
Ciara Sing, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Gold Key for “Melodies In Florence, Alabama”
Ciara Sing, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Gold Key and American Voices Nomination for “For The Black Boys That Never Learned How To Swim”
Ciara Sing, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Gold Key and American Voices Nomination for “Mother’s Morning Prayer”
Science Fiction/Fantasy
Will Thayer, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Gold Key for “Rising”
Lily Wang, Franklin Regional Senior High School, Gold Key for “CAPTCHA This”
Short Story
Will Thayer, Pittsburgh CAPA School, Honorable Mention for “Turpentine”
Emily Weiss, Shady Side Academy Senior School, Silver Key for “Democritus”