Pictured: Student Winners in 2023: Michelle Calderon, Maddy Smith, Morgan Thrapp, and Odalys Adame. Photo courtesy of the NTCC Eagle and Mandy Smith.
By: Dr. Andrew Yox, Honors Director
Honors Northeast, the honors program of Northeast Texas Community College announces a call for poems and images that can accent or enliven our sense of the surroundings, people, the culture, and/or the history of Northeast Texas.
Adult poetry winners will take home $100 and $50 for first and second place. Full-time student poetry winners for first, second, third, and fourth places will receive $400, $300, $200 and $100 respectively. For images, first place will earn $70, second, $20, and third, $10. Anyone of any age is welcome to enter the contest. Any genre of poem, and at any length, can compete. A single contestant can submit a maximum of one poem and one image for consideration.
For the seventh time, the contest will include an image division. A contestant must submit an original scene photograph, or photograph of their own original painting, along with two sentences explaining its location in Northeast Texas and meaning. To win an award, contestants must be willing to read their poems, or present their images at the Friday 6 September Poetry Reading at the NTCC Whatley Foyer at 11:00 a.m. Two committees of NTCC faculty judges will determine the top poems, and images.
To compete, send preliminary questions, and/or your poem and/or image, principle occupation, and telephone number to Honors Director, Dr. Andrew Yox, at ayox@ntcc.edu by noon on Friday, 30 August. For images please send only one JPEG image from 500 KB to 4 MB of a scene in Northeast Texas. Contestants may consult the poems and images of all past winners since 2008 with an internet query to <www.ntcc.edu/honorspoems>. The Honors Northeast site also contains prize winning essays and feature-length films on Northeast Texas.
This year the contest is beholden to the Whatley Employee Enhancement Fund process, Mrs. Karen Harmon of Mount Pleasant, and other friends of Honors Northeast.
