Saturday, February 20, the Athens Middle School "Power of the Pen" Creative Writing Team participated in the Southeastern District Tournament at Marietta College. The tournament welcomed over one hundred students from schools from throughout the southeastern district. The AMS 7th Grade team finished first and the Eighth Grade team finished fifth. Individually, the day was a huge one for seventh grader Emma Brown. Not only was she the Grand Champion Writer among seventh graders, but her second-round narrative earned a Best of Round award. That's not all. She won two of three exemplary writing awards, including one given to the best writer in the tournament. What a day for Emma! Other AMS individuals earning trophies or medals included Devon Halliday, who placed eleventh among eighth graders and who also won a Best of Round for her first-round narrative; Daniela Grijalva, who placed tenth in seventh grade; Ruby Cribbet, who placed sixth in seventh grade; Emma Fenstermaker, who placed second in 7th grade; and Lucy Riesbeck, who won a Best of Round award for her third-round narrative. All of these individuals automatically qualify for the Regional Tournament to be held Saturday, March 20, 2010, at Unioto Junior High School in Chillicothe. Other AMS writers might qualify for Regionals as well. Those names will become available at some point over the next ten days when all rankings and statistics from the District Tournament are made available.
Other AMS writers who participated in the District Tournament include Eighth Graders Reiya Bhat, Maile Orr, Megan Myers, who received an Honorable Mention for her round-three essay, Maya Sattler, Holly Li, and Amirah Fauzi, and Seventh Graders Lark Knutsen, Hayley Devore, Lindsey, Bowman, and Vanessa Carey.
Other AMS students who participate in Power of the Pen include Eighth Graders Affan Bhutta, Emma McLaughlin, and Dylan Lane and Seventh Graders Baylee Gorham, Ashton Horsley, Weston Kinghorn, Abby Lawrence, Sydney Marrs, Abe Ogles, Elaina Seyfang, Zachary Shrivers, Eliza Wong, KavyaYellamraju, and Serena Zhu.
The AMS Power of the Pen team would like to thank the following for their help and support: Kristin Camara, Holly Korn, Matt Bunting, Stephanie Kight, Pam Thomas, Betsy Anderson, Paul Grippa, Mark Halliday, Pam Brown, Faith Knutsen, Carolyn Orr, Brian Hall and Century National Bank, and the AMS PTO.