Eighth-Grade Power of the Pen Team Secures Historic 2nd Place Finish, Individual Writers Earn Top Honors and Awards

The eighth-grade Power of the Pen team placed 2^nd out of 33 teams that competed in the regional Power of the Pen tournament, which was held at Cincinnati Country Day School in February.

Congratulations to Automne Beauchamp (North College Hill), Bea Collett (Madeira), Ethan Kern (Symmes Township), Dominique Makasiar (Symmes Township), Melanie Young (Loveland), and Delle Zamary (Indian Hill).

“This is a first in the history of Country Day’s participation in the program,” said Emily DiMatteo, Power of the Pen coach and Middle School English teacher. “These team awards are often secured by larger-school competitors. What's even more impressive is that only two of these six writers were on the team last year!”

In addition, Ethan placed 3^rd and Dominique placed 10^th out of 88 eighth-grade writers in the individual writing portion of the competition. Dominique also won a best-of-round award at the district tournament for her third-round piece, which was a prompt asking students to write a story about their arch-nemesis. She wrote a story – titled “The Battle of the Bladder” – about a protagonist whose antagonist was her own bladder – she was desperate to go to the bathroom!

“Judges loved the use of humor and creativity in the piece,” says Emily.

Also landing in a top spot at the regional competition was Melanie Young, who placed 10^th among the eighth-grade writers.

“I would attribute the team’s success to a few unique conditions: our Middle School faculty, a competitive peer pool, positive peer pressure, and reading,” says Emily. “The teachers have made space and time for creative and low-stakes writing in their classes, allowing students to find and fine-tune their writerly voices. And with this team specifically, they all are, first and foremost, readers with voracious reading appetites. Also, these writers enjoy each other’s company and offer each other real feedback to hold each other to high standards.”

The state tournament will be held at Ashland University on Wednesday and Thursday, May 21 and 22. Click this link for more information about Power of the Pen.