Photo by Thomas Forman
Photography Editor
Four SPHS students achieved national acclaim this past week, winning national medals in the annual Scholastic Art and Writing Awards. Seniors Jacey Lee, Jin Young Seo, Sammy Park, and junior Jiamin Xu were four of this year’s silver medalists in the national competition. Lee and Park both received writing awards, one for poetry and the other for her writing portfolio, while Seo was given an art award for her comic illustrations. Junior Jiamin Xu was given a silver medal for his critical essay. While they will not be going to Carnegie hall to receive these awards, these students will be recognized by scholastic.
Park’s silver medal in “writing portfolio” marks the first time that South Pasadena has won a medal in this particularly prestigious category. A portfolio incorporates multiple pieces of work from an author. 2017-2018 also marks the largest number of national medals won by South Pasadena so far, which likely is a result of wider participation.
“More students are applying, which is a great reflection of the creative talent we have here on campus,” English teacher Diane Shires said. “The challenge is to get the word out on how great winning a Scholastic Award looks on college applications and scholarship.”
Most of the submissions from South Pasadena this year were in the categories of writing and illustration of some kind, but other categories such as filmmaking and architecture design are available. Altogether, Shires is proud of this year’s medalists and optimistic when looking towards the future for South Pasadena students at the Art and Writing awards.
“The breadth and depth in the art work and writing submissions this year from SP shows maturity and skill,” Shires said. “I’m excited to work to get more students to submit in more categories.”
