Clinton-Massie Middle School’s Maddie Brausch has written her way into the State Power of the Pen Tournament that will take place at the College of Wooster May 26-27.
Brausch qualified after completing three rounds of rigorous writing during the regional tournament held March 19 at Wyoming Middle School, where 116 seventh-grade and 128 eighth-grade students from 41 schools battled it out by composing creative story lines filled with advanced vocabulary and complex sentence structures that evoked powerful imagery from start to finish.
Brausch earned “Best of Round” recognition during the first round of writing when her composition “The Sky Will Cry for You Also” scored the highest among 116 submissions.
During the final level of competition, Brausch will join 650 writers from over 250 schools throughout the state of Ohio, all of whom are determined to demonstrate their excellence in writing and are vying for the trophies, savings bonds, cash prizes and college scholarships valued at more than $24,000.
She faced some stiff competition before advancing to the state level as several Clinton County students were also yielding powerful pens.
Representing Blanchester Local Schools during the regional competition were Blanchester seventh-grader Alex Sutherland and eighth-graders Lilly Brown and Alexis Davis.
Brausch’s Clinton-Massie teammates included seventh-graders Barek Bennett, Abby George and Abby Schneider and eighth-graders Amelia Binau, Ben Ryan, Wesley Vert, Savannah Henderson and Ally Wellman.
During the Sweepstakes Competition that ranks schools based on the accumulated individual points acquired throughout the three rounds of writing for both the seventh- and eighth-grade divisions, the CM team earned the ranking of ninth out of 41 schools.
Representing East Clinton were seventh-grader Van Frye and eighth-graders Jessica Allbright, Ariona Fair, Noah Pattan and Ethan Reedy.
Representing Wilmington were eighth graders Sophia Agee, Josie Nichols and Chloe Williams.
Information for this article was provided by Diana Miller, who coordinates communications for several area schools.