2021 Sejong Writing Competition
Sijo Winners
| Adult Division | Pre-college Division | |
|---|---|---|
| First Place | Sharon Drummond Pickerington, OH sijo |
Livia Huang Sussex, WI 12th grade, (Elizabeth Jorgensen) Arrowhead Union High School sijo |
| Second Place | Terri Carnell Nashotah, WI sijo |
Sydney Stemper Hartland, WI 12th grade, (Elizabeth Jorgensen) Arrowhead Union High School sijo |
| Third Place | Laura Jan Lodle Midland, TX sijo |
Allison Gardner Hartland, WI 11th grade, (Elizabeth Jorgensen) Arrowhead Union High School sijo |
| Nora Murphy Glenmont, NY 10th grade, (Robin Henderson Tocci) Academy of the Holy Names sijo |
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| Honorable Mention Friend of the Pacific Rim Award |
Joshua Foster Glen Burnie, MD sijo |
Meredith Dunning Bloominton, IN 8th grade, (Linda Scott) Jackson Creek Middle School sijo |
| Sarah Julian Oaklahoma City, OK sijo |
Abigayle Groth Sussex, WI 12th grade, (Terri Carnell) Arrowhead Union High School sijo |
|
| Jiyoung Lee Torrance, CA sijo |
Reilly Mader Oconomowoc, WI 11th Grade, (Elizabeth Jorgensen) Arrowhead Union High School sijo |
|
| Lucy Luna Chicago, IL sijo |
John Miller |
|
Amy Manion |
Lukas Paegle Bloominton, IN 8th grade, (Linda Scott) Jackson Creek Middle School sijo |
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| Sarah Taylor Hacienda Heights, CA sijo |
Allison Yun Manhattan Beach, CA 11th grade, (Sean McGrath) Chadwick School sijo |
( ) Teacher's name
Adult division
I enjoy teaching English language arts and social studies to 4th grade gifted students at a middle school in Pickerington, Ohio. While teaching my students to write sijo during our poetry unit this spring, I decided to enter my own sijo into the Sejong Writing Competition.
I was introduced to sijo during a NCTA study tour to Korea in the summer of 2017. I was fascinated by its history and how men would gather in the park to sing sijo. Later that year, I participated in a sijo workshop in Chicago through the Sejong Cultural Society and learned to write in this unique form. One of my favorite parts of sijo is the twist in the third line, which movingly expresses contrasts in life.
This sijo was inspired by my personal hero, my mother. Now 90, she has been dealing with the challenges of getting older, including the loss of some of her favorite activities. Growing up, I greatly benefitted from her skills as a seamstress, yet she has accepted the fact that she can no longer sew. The week of the competition deadline, she gave me the last line of the sijo as she donated her many boxes of fabric to someone at her church.
My future goals include broadening the teaching of sijo in my school district. When I am away from the classroom, I love visiting historical sites and foreign cities.
Although I have been an English teacher for 27 years, I taught a creative writing class for the first time this year. And, with the help of my colleague Liz Jorgensen, I loved it. She introduced me to the sijo format and competition, providing me with examples and encouragement as I tried a few topics, finally settling on one I liked. And, since I always write along with my students, they were able to see my process--struggles and successes--which inspired them to write their own sijo poems and enter the competition as well.
As a mother of three boys, I enjoy watching sports and staying active with them. I also love baking and reading. Growing up, my parents taught me the value of hard work, love, and respect, and I am so grateful for their positive influence in my life. I can't wait to share this poetry form with future students. It's amazing what can happen when we try new ways of writing.
I am an active member of Fan Story which is an online writing program. I heard of this contest from another member. I enjoy writing in many different genres, and I am always open to learning new styles. I am learning more about Japanese poetry styles such as haiku. I was immediately intrigued with the focus of this contest.
My maternal grandfather is my personal hero. He taught me by his example. He possessed a strong work ethic, strong faith, and never met a stranger. I enjoy working with animals, reading, writing, antiquing, baking, and cooking.
My future goals include learning more about writing to improve my skills. Currently, I am working on a novel.
This Sijo competition came to me through a newsletter, daring me to play with a traditional form, then teaching me that within a semi-rigid structure one, indeed, has much flexibility so long as the musicality of our words remains. Creating spaces—through words and structure in writing, with wood and joints for furniture, with plants and stone in gardenscapes—this is my joy.
My heroes are not individuals but instead ideas, values—justice, kindness, compassion for the Othered—for they who bear such ideas will act heroically. To hold tightly to these ideas, these values, to leave goodness rather than destruction in the wake of my life, that is my only goal.
The Oklahoma State Department of Education shared the competition information in one of their newsletters.
I usually write prose poetry, so I enjoyed learning a new style I've not previously used in conveying my thoughts.
I am a voracious reader, I knit, and I love to travel. I also love spending time with my husband birdwatching and being in the quiet among the trees on our land.
I will use this as the impetus to submit more of my poetry to various publications.
I've been in the U.S for only nine months now. I was and am still having a hard time because settling down in a whole new world is a big thing, and I'm struggling with English, too. It was hard not to have time for myself, so I started searching for what I could do.
I found out that there is Sijo Competition. I didn't know much about the Sijo, but it was enough to raise a sense of challenge for me, who likes writing and reading. I found the format and samples from the Sejong Cultural Society website then read them over and over again.
Everyone who knows how to embrace other cultures without ostracizing them is a hero to me. And my husband and children, who always believe in me, are my heroes, too. I enjoy writing and reading the most. I hope I can continue to write and read. If I can get a Ph.D. in the U.S., that would be the icing on the cake.
(in the form of a sijo)
As a high school English/Korean teacher in Chicago,
I ask my students to try the sijo contest every year.
This year, though, I wrote a sijo too and am thankful I did!
I am a singer-songwriter and spoken word artist based in Cambridge, Massachusetts. I heard about the sijo poetry competition while searching for writing opportunities. The sijo structure enabled me to capture a serious subject matter and experience in a way that felt manageable, redeeming, hopeful, and fun. I felt especially aided in this endeavor by the element of the pastoral theme in sijo poetry. Appreciating nature and how transcendent it is helps me to look beyond myself and my struggles. It helps me to know I belong and that I am not alone. Getting my poem accepted encourages me to keep doing what I love, expressing myself creatively. It also helps me to feel validated in my experience and as a writer.
I enjoy watching anything comedic: from SNL, to tv shows, movies, and standup specials. I also love gospel music. I am particularly interested in racial justice and mental health awareness. My personal hero, is Heidi Lee, a Korean-American woman who is an amazing visual artist and champion for justice, as evidenced by her work with the homeless population in the Boston area for many years, originally as a teaching artist and now as an outreach worker, and her fight for racial justice and mental health advocacy, particularly in the Asian American community. My future goals include continuing to fight for justice through the arts and to grow creatively while doing so. One way I am realizing this goal is through my participation in the spoken word collaborative, Spitting Fire for Freedom, recipient of a Public Art for Spatial Justice grant through the New England Foundation for the Arts. We will be performing our spoken word pieces at an online event slated for August 2021 through nonprofit COCO Brown in Haverhill, Massachusetts.
I first learned about sijo at the Hangeul Museum in Seoul. I was so struck by the soothing cadence of the poems, and immediately became a huge fan of sijo. Since then, I received my certification to teach sijo through the Sejong Cultural Society, which is where I learned about this contest.
What struck me the most about the pandemic was how each of us had to evaluate the privilege that we are afforded through any number of factors. Whether it is our gender, race, physical ability, economic status or other facets of our existence, we have to use our privilege and freedom to create and provide opportunities to others.
This sijo is about moving through the world with physical advantages that not everyone is born with or given.
My lifelong hobbies include traveling, baking, reading, dancing, languages, writing, and I’m always looking to discover more! My personal hero is my mother who raised me as a single mother, which now that I am an adult trying to make it in this world, I have even more respect for, and am always in awe of her sacrifice.
I’m currently developing two manuscripts and plan to publish a book of my own sijo poetry.
Pre-college division
My name is Livia Huang, and I’m a senior at Arrowhead High School. I will be attending Johns Hopkins University this fall and hope to continue in the science field.
I first learned about the sijo poem in English class but was reintroduced to it in band class when we played Variations on a Korean Folk Song. I love how the few syllables could contain so much meaning, and I’m very grateful for all the encouragement from my English teacher Ms. Jorgensen to express my passions in writing.
I am Sydney Stemper, a senior at Arrowhead High School in Hartland, Wisconsin. I heard about this competition through my creative writing teacher, Ms. Jorgensen. While writing my sijo, I learned about the format of it, and how it is different from a haiku. I love to travel with my family to many different places.
My favorite place was probably when we went to a small island right outside of Puerto Rico called Vieques. I also love to spend time out on the lake in the summer with my friends.
I am planning on attending the University of Northern Iowa where I will be majoring in Psychology and minoring in Criminology. I am also a competitive swimmer so I will be swimming at the University of Northern Iowa.
My name is Allison Gardner. I am currently in 11th grade at Arrowhead Union High School. I heard about this competition from my creative writing teacher, Ms. Jorgensen. She taught me the sijo form and I learned about how I can express my feelings of loss. I learned that losing someone isn’t always about frustration and pain; it’s also about acceptance. I recently lost a family member, and after writing this poem, it helped me manage my grief.
My personal hobbies and interests are running. I’m in cross country and I’m a world class puzzler, as my mom would say. I enjoy music a lot because of the way it makes me feel. My personal hero is definitely my mom. She is the strongest, most hard working, powerful person I know. My mom is one of my best friends and she means the world to me. I read her my sijo while I was writing it and she loved it, especially since the poem was written about her mom.
My future goal is to become a nurse, have a family, and to do things that make me happy.
My Name is Nora Murphy; I’m a sophomore at the Academy of the Holy Names in Albany, New York. I love to play sports and hang out with my friends, and I hope to go into the medical field when I am older. I never considered myself a writer, but I am beyond thankful for this opportunity. I heard about this competition from my writing teacher, Mrs. Tocci, who is a great inspiration to me and has helped me become a better writer.
Rain has always been one of my favorite things, hearing the sound of rain on the roof or watching it become one with a lake or an ocean. Even through a dark time, especially during quarantine, rain can bring a rainbow.
Hi, my name is Meredith. I heard about this competition through my 8th grade teacher who taught us how to write Sijos as well. I learned while writing Sijo that a whole story can be fit into a small poem.
Some things I do in my spare time are swim, read, and other things. I have many future goals but the most important one is to just be the best person I can be.
My name is Abby Groth, and I am a senior at Arrowhead High School in Hartland, WI. In my free time I enjoy spending time with my family and friends. I also love to spend time outside going on hikes, going to the lake, or watching sunsets. In the fall I will be attending Nova Southeastern University to pursue a degree in marine biology.
I entered this competition through my advanced composition class. I am thankful for my teacher, Mrs. Carnell, for showing me this competition and teaching me about the craft of writing sijos.
My name is Reilly Mader and I’m currently a junior at Arrowhead High School. I first heard about this competition from my creative writing teacher, Ms. Jorgensen. I was very excited about this task and was looking forward to what I could do with this type of writing. When writing my sijo poem, I realized that expression comes in different varieties including pure emotion, past knowledge, and current thoughts. I learned that I am not as tough as I may have thought; I’m emotional and care very strongly about my family and their actions and how they affect me.
I am very passionate about sports including tennis and golf. I enjoy spending time with my family because I always crack a laugh. I also love helping people get out of their shells and helping them boost their confidence when it’s too low.
My personal hero is my grandpa. He was recently diagnosed with throat cancer and was very heartbroken about the news, but he has stayed strong and continues to enjoy life to the fullest whether that’s playing tennis with his grandsons or gardening at his lake house. My grandpa powers through just about anything and he’ll always be my hero.
My future goals include becoming a professional golf player and competing on tour as Tiger Woods did in his twenties. Secondly, I want to have a family and provide a nice life for them. I would also like to attend and graduate school and become a Nike crew designer that creates and inspires change in the world by the outfits and shoes I custom make for the Nike community. I plan on entering this competition in the coming years and improving on where I was just a year ago.
My name is John Miller and I am a senior at Luverne High School in Luverne, MN. I am very interested in literature, however poetry has never been one of my favorite areas, so I was very happy to find and learn about sijo poems, a type of poetry I do thoroughly enjoy now after discovering it. It was very interesting and enjoyable to find a new way to express myself through writing. After high school I plan to attend the SD School of Mines for a degree in Mechanical Engineering.
It may seem cliché to thank an English teacher for a poetry award, however I assure you there is no other person more deserving of thanks than my AP Literature teacher Amy Sahly. Without her I would not be the person I am today and I most certainly would not have won this award without her determination to bring out the best in everybody around her. Time and time again she has pushed me to better myself and I can say without a fraction of a doubt that she has succeeded in every attempt. I would not have the love and passion for writing and for literature that I have today, nor would I be as prepared for the challenges ahead of me if it was not for Ms. Sahly. I have been very lucky to have her as a teacher and I thank her now for all she has done for me.
I heard about the sijo competition from my English teacher Mrs. Scott. I learned that words are not the story itself; they are only the backbone. Your imagination will set the mood and fill in the details.
My personal hero is my sister. She is a swimmer and has gone through a lot while still making it to be top 2 in the country. My future goals are to make the Olympics as a swimmer.
My name is Allison Yun. I am currently a junior at Chadwick School in California, and I heard about this competition through my school. Practicing sijo has taught me to be a more thoughtful, economical writer due to the poem’s stringent structure.
Recently, diversity work has become one of my greatest passions, as I am a student leader for my school’s Asian American Student Association and a member of the Student Diversity Council. I have been discovering my voice over the past few years.
I'm excited that I can now use poetry as another means to raise awareness and effect change, especially with the rise in anti-Asian hate. In addition to writing poetry, I am captain of my school’s dance program, class president, a member of our gospel choir, and an award-winning concert pianist.