NT_021518

northbrooktower.com life & arts
the northbrook tower | February 15, 2018 | 31
600 students recite poetry readings
Martin Carlino, Editor
Glenbrook North freshman
Haley Sandlow
stepped up on stage, took a
deep breath, looked out to
a crowd of more than 100
students, faculty and parents
and began to recite the
first line of John McCrae’s
“In Flanders Fields.”
With Sandlow’s declaim
of the noted wartime
poem’s first stanza, Glenbrook
North’s inaugural
participation in a national
contest known as Poetry
Out Loud was underway.
In total, more than 600
GBN — and some Glenbrook
South — students,
spanning more than 30
different English classes,
recited poems they memorized
in front of their respective
classes.
Sandlow was just one
of 30 students selected by
GBN educators as class finalists
to perform on Feb.
7 in the GBN library for
the chance to advance to
the contest’s regional competition
on Feb. 21.
“This is our first year
participating in the national
contest and, honestly,
just the process is
making it all worthwhile,”
said Karen Cunningham,
instructional supervisor of
the English department at
GBN.
Cunningham first got
word of Poetry Out Loud
while attending a summer
workshop at the Chicago
Poetry Foundation.
“[The instructors of that
workshop] first told us
of this and talked about
all the positives they had
gotten from watching students
perform,” she said.
“This year, I’m the instructional
supervisor and
I just said ‘let’s do this,
let’s give it a try.’”
Cunningham and a
group of several other
judges helped determine
the winner of GBN’s final
by formulating a score for
each student. To calculate
each student’s score,
the judges followed scoring
guidelines set by Poetry
Out Loud organizers,
which evaluates performers
on a variety of criteria.
After the completion
of each student performance
— which each
roughly ranged from 30
to 90 seconds — judges
scored GBS junior Sabina
Roberts’ rendition of Tony
Hoagland’s “Please Don’t”
as the top performance of
the afternoon. Roberts was
able to participate in the
event because of her enrollment
in the Glenbrook
Academy, a district-wide,
four-year program for high
achieving students.
Despite the poem’s tenstanza
length, Roberts was
unfazed by the memorization
requirement of the
contest.
“I was a little nervous,
but not that much,” Roberts
said. “It was kind of
scary at first, but once I got
started, I was fine.”
But, because of a technicality
with the competition’s
registration system,
it’s unlikely Roberts will
be able to advance to the
regional final.
Per Cunningham, GBN
senior Katherine Friedan
will likely represent GBN
on Feb. 21. Friedan earned
first runner-up for her performance
of Rita Dove’s
“American Smooth.”
For Friedan, picking a
poem that she found meaningful
was of the utmost
importance.
GBS junior Sabina Roberts performs “Please Don’t.”
Roberts’ reading earned the highest score from judges.
“I wanted to pick a
poem that resonated with
me,” she said. “I probably
went through 100 poems.
I narrowed it down to poems
I thought would speak
well.”
As part of her advancement
to the regional
event, Friedan will have
to memorize and recite an
additional poem. As for
insights into her selection,
Friedan still holds meaning
at the top of the list.
“I’m still not sure on
my second selection, but
it will still be important to
me to pick something that
has meaning and speaks to
me,” she said.
Other top finishers included
GBN senior Jeremy
Stein, for his reading
of “Where the Wild Things
Go” and GBN junior Erin
Rosenfeld, who used sign
language to perform her
poem.
Regardless of students’
scores, Cunningham
couldn’t have been more
pleased with the impact of
GBN’s first year in Poetry
Out Loud.
“It just makes me super
proud of our students,” she
said. “It’s just a different
way of showcasing their
talents and passions and
most importantly getting
them to realize they do like
poetry.”
Full story at Northbrooktower.com
Glenbrook North senior Katherine Friedan performs
“American Smooth” as one of 30 finalists in GBN’s
Poetry Out Loud contest readings on Feb. 7 in the GBN
library. Photos by Martin Carlino/22nd Century Media
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