Palm Beach Poetry Festival Launches 16th Annual Poetry Contest For Local High School Students

Blaise Allen, Ph.D., the Director of Community Outreach for the Palm Beach Poetry Festival, today announced that the non-profit organization has launched its annual Palm Beach County High School Poetry Contest, in partnership with Old School Square in Delray Beach.

From October 15 through December 1, 2019, any Palm Beach County public or private high school student can submit one original poem (30 lines maximum) for consideration. Original poems should be submitted by email before midnight on December 13 to: PBPF1@aol.com. For contest rules, please visit www.palmbeachpoetryfestival.org.

The winning poet will receive $200, and a pair of tickets to the Friday Night Poetry Reading on January 24 featuring 2018 NAACP Image Award Winner and Kingsley Tufts Poetry Award recipient Patricia Smith, the Poetry Festival's 2020 Poet-at-Large,

The four runner-up high school poets will each receive $100. All five winning teen poets will read their poems at the Festival's Award Ceremony on Monday, January 20, 2020 at 5 pm, where they will have the opportunity of meeting and having their pictures taken with nearly a dozen of America's most distinguished and award-winning poets.

In addition, the winning high school poets will each receive a one-year subscription to Poets and Writers Literary Journal, and their poems will be published online on the Festival's official website (www.palmbeachpoetryfestival.org).

The judge for the annual High School Poetry Contest will once again be Dr. Jeff Morgan of Lynn University's Department of English in Boca Raton.

The 16th annual Palm Beach Poetry Festival will be held January 20-25. 2020 at Old School Square in Delray Beach. The Festival will feature top poets at numerous ticketed public events, including readings, talks, interviews, panel discussions and more. Poetry workshops will be offered for which applications are required.

The Workshop Faculty of the 2020 Palm Beach Poetry Festival will include Laure-Anne Bosselaar, Nickole Brown/Jessica Jacobs, Reginald Gibbons, Major Jackson, Ilya Kaminsky, Dana Levin, Adrian Matejka, and Maggie Smith. One-on-One Conference Faculty includes Lorna Blake, Sally Bliumis-Dunn, and Angela Narciso Torres. Native American poet-musician and recently named U.S. Poet Laureate Joy Harjo will be Special Guest Poet in 2020, and Poet-at-Large Patricia Smith will give readings at four local high schools and at the Crest Theatre on Friday, January 24.

The Palm Beach Poetry Festival 2019 was presented in partnership with Old School Square and was generously sponsored by Art Works of the National Endowment for the Arts, Morgan Stanley, The Legacy Group of Morgan Stanley's Atlanta, GA office, the Cultural Council of Palm Beach County, The Tourist Development Council of Palm Beach County; the Board of Commissioners of Palm Beach County, The Palm Beach Post, a grant from Visit Florida, WLRN-FM, and Murder on the Beach, Delray Beach's independent bookseller.

In 2010, the Palm Beach Poetry Festival received an Arts Challenge Grant from The John S. and James L. Knight Foundation; and in 2011, it was presented with The Muse Award for Outstanding Cultural Organization (with a budget under $500,000) by the Cultural Council of Palm Beach County.

For more information about the Palm Beach Poetry Festival, please visit www.palmbeachpoetryfestival.org.

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