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The night you’ve been waiting for

Hello, Vision+Voice fans and families!

Here’s some information so you know what to expect at tonight’s Award Reception.

Our overall goal is to make the Vision+Voice honorees feel like rock-stars at the award reception. We want the students to see themselves as artists whose expression of self is important to the world.

We will have a great buffet of tapas-style food catered by students in ACC’s Hospitality Program. There will be a red-carpet with paparazzi, film crews will be documenting and live-streaming, and we have a writer who will be interviewing students and parents to capture info that she’ll use for an article about V+V. What a night!

Vision+Voice honorees will each get a goody bag with special treats — including the 2017 Vision+Voice Anthology and a certificate of achievement. And we have lots of posters to give away.

The program will feature speakers from ACC and AISD, and will include the videos of the students reading their poems. Our Master of Ceremonies is an award-winning poet and educator who is coming all the way from New Orleans for this event.

Please bring your friends and family to enjoy the festivities.

Doors open at 6:30pm, the program starts at 7pm.
Location: ACC Eastview Campus, 3401 Webberville Road, Room 8500
Park in any student or faculty spot in Lot G or Lot E
And, as if that’s not enough, we’ve added a feature to our website: You can now subscribe to get all the latest news and updates from the Vision+Voice team!
I hope you’ll give us feedback on Vision+Voice. We’re always looking for ways to make it better and more meaningful for your students.
See you soon!
The Vision+Voice Team

Vision+Voice Award Reception Master of Ceremonies

We are thrilled to announce that our Master of Ceremonies for this year’s Award Reception is Brad Richard, chair of the creative writing program at Lusher Charter School in New Orleans.

“As a poet, a teacher, and an advocate for young writers, I’m delighted to be part of this celebration of these poets,” says Richard. “There are few things I love more than seeing young people get recognition for extraordinary creative work, so I can’t wait to join in the applause!”

2015 Louisiana Artist of the Year, and poetry winner in the 2002 Poets & Writers Writers Exchange competition, Brad is the author of three collections of poems, Habitations, Motion Studies (winner of the 2010 Washington Prize) and Butcher’s Sugar, and two chapbooks, The Men in the Dark and Curtain Optional. His poems and reviews have appeared in Gettysburg Review, Okey-Panky, Unlikely Stories, Guernica, American Letters & Commentary, and other journals. Mr. Richard is co-director of the southeast Louisiana affiliate of the Scholastic Writing Awards and of The New Orleans New Writers Literary Festival. He is a recipient of fellowships from the Surdna Foundation, the Louisiana Division of the Arts, and the National Endowment for the Humanities.

The Vision+Voice Award Reception will be held on Friday, April 28th from 6:30-8:30pm at Austin Community College’s Eastview Campus (3401 Webberville Road).
Please join us!

KLRU Taping

Hello, Vision+Voice Poets, Parents, and Teachers!

Congratulations to all the poets for having your work selected for recognition in the 2017 Vision+Voice Poetry Contest! This year, over 400 poems were submitted to the contest from students all over Austin, so you should be proud of this accomplishment. I am so excited to see all of these amazing poems published in the 2017 Vision+Voice Anthology, and to see the winning poems transformed into posters.

One of the special things we do for Vision+Voice poets is to arrange a taping of each poet reading their poem at the historic KLRU Studio 6 – a.k.a. the birthplace of Austin City Limits. This year, we are inviting ALL winning and honorable mention poets to come in and tape their poems.
Here’s a link to previous tapings so you can see how cool this is.

The taping is scheduled for Monday, March 27.
PLEASE contact me to schedule a time to come in to do the taping.  (The taping is really easy and takes no more than 15 minutes)
Thanks – I look forward to meeting you!
Polly Monear, Vision+Voice Coordinator
512-223-3352 / pmonear@austincc.edu

2016-17 Winners

We are delighted to announce the winners of the 2016-17 Vision+Voice poetry contest! First choice poems will be paired with art by an ACC art student to create posters, and all the winning poems will be collected into the 2016-17 anthology.

Mark your calendars and plan to attend the Vision+Voice Award Reception:
Friday, April 28
6:30pm
ACC Eastview Campus, 3401 Webberville Road

More info coming soon!

Winning Poems

Kindergarten: Whale, Elle J., Ridgetop Elementary
First: My Story, Ana D., Ross Baldwin Elementary
Second: Tsunami, Ryan H., Boone Elementary
Third: Art, Ivy N., Baldwin Elementary
Fourth: Time, Martha N., Casis Elementary
Fifth: The Flow of Life, Janhavi K., Bernice Kiker Elementary
Sixth: The Heart Hears Music, Lily C., Lamar Middle School
Seventh: Pearl Whiskers, Ivy M., The Ann Richards School
Eighth: Empty Scars, Rachel P., Covington Middle School
Ninth: Nothing, Blayce W., William B. Travis Early College High School
Tenth:  Light (And Not), Miranda H., McCallum High School
Eleventh: Badland, Saylor H., James Bowie High School
Twelfth: Deep in the Heart, Hailey A., James Bowie High School
Dean’s Choice: El Monstruo, Ximena S., Barbara Jordan Elementary

Honorable Mention Poems

Kindergarten: Polar Bear, Ruby L., Rodriguez Elementary
Kindergarten: Monster Truck, Xavier J., Rodriguez Elementary
First: Just Be Happy, Christopher Z., Odom Elementary
Second: Time, Astrid F., Gullett Elementary
Second: Christmas, Alyssa T., Baranoff Elementary
Third: What I Like, Eva D., Blanton Elementary
Third: In the Front Yard, Lark T., Bryker Woods Elementary
Fourth: To Swim, Olivia A., Casis Elementary
Fourth: My Sister Ate My Homework, Malachi J., Boone Elementary
Fifth: The Ocean, Nicole P., Kiker Elementary
Fifth: Dreams, Nicole P., Kiker Elementary
Sixth: My Family is Like the Ocean, Omar U, Gorzycki Middle School
Sixth: Sunrise, Megan S., Gorzycki Middle School
Seventh: Underwater, Peyton C., Lamar Middle School
Seventh: Dysl3xia, Ryan O., Gorzycki Middle School
Eighth: Chains, Samantha P., Gorzycki Middle School
Eighth: Home, Kelsey N., Fulmore Middle School
Ninth: Color Guard, Talia H., James Bowie High School
Tenth: Ode to the Night, Marisa R., Anderson High School
Eleventh: BLM, Charlotte T., James Bowie High School
Eleventh: Bloodletting, Riley E., Garza Independence High School
Twelfth: Zephyr, Rachel C., James Bowie High School
Twelfth: Repress, Disaster Alike, Don’t You, Nicole H., James Bowie High School
Dean’s Choice: Gus, Diane D, Gorzycki Middle School

Thanks to all the parents and teachers who support our poets! Special thanks to AISD for helping to make Vision+Voice possible.

And to our poets: It’s your vision, and your voice. Thanks!

Submissions for 2016-17 have closed!

Thanks to all our poets, teachers, and parents! We appreciate your support.

We are hard at work processing  submissions to get them published here on the Vision+Voice site. Check back, read some poems, and rate your favorites!

Attention Poets!!! Please check your poems to be sure they appear the way you intended. Let us know if you have corrections. Thanks!

Poems will soon be submitted to our judges — stay tuned!

V+V Deadline Extension

Vision+Voice has extended the deadline for submissions until Jan. 27th! Get your poem on!

Vision+Voice offers K through 12 students a literacy experience that celebrates creativity and expression. It also fosters multiple venues for students to become published authors, with greater access to share their work with audiences. Students are free to determine the topic and type of poem to submit. Poems of any language from grades K-12 are accepted.

Vision+Voice Poetry Reading at Malvern Books Dec. 4

Vision+Voice is fortunate to have some great support from the Austin community, and one of our favorite community partners is Malvern Books. Not only do they display the most recent set of V+V posters in their store for the entire month of December, but they also host the annual Vision+Voice Poetry Reading every December. It’s a wonderful cozy setting for a poetry reading, and an excellent opportunity for students to read their poems in front of a very supportive live audience.

We’ll have posters and anthologies available if you need extra copies for the holidays.

Please mark your calendars, invite your friends and family, and come join the party at Malvern Books!

Sunday, December 4th 
2-4pm
Malvern Books: 613 W. 29th Street

vv-malvern-poetry-reading_flier_printready

For more info: pmonear@austincc.edu / 512.375.6710