In honor of Black History Month, we wanted to share this announcement that was shared with us. What a wonderful community building event!
Background:
The Mary C Jenkins Community Center (MCJCC) Board is sponsoring a community-wide poetry contest to honor Black History Month and recognize progress re-establishing the MCJCC.
Poetry is IT right now.
Amanda Gorman, our first National Youth Poet Laureate, 22 years old, moved us deeply with her inauguration poem, The Hill We Climb.
Also in January, Kwame Alexander (poet who visited the Transylvania County library in April 2019!), crowdsourced a poem to offer people a way to “write our way out of the unprecedented events of the past year and into a space of possibility.”
Kwame and National Public Radio received 2,500 entries from people of all ages for the crowdsourced poem.
Less than 50 were crafted into the final poem, This is Our Dream, which includes a submission by teacher Jeanne DeJong, from 5th graders at Brevard Elementary School! https://www.npr.org/
That Brevard is represented in this poem, and the voice of our youth, is very inspiring.
Please circulate this announcement for the poetry contest to all. Open to all ages. Cash prizes.
Poetry rules!
You can find the details of the contest here: MCJCC Poetry Contest Announcement.final-1
