High School Poets Compete in GRAND SLAM FINALS for the 2016 World Champion DC Youth Slam Team!
High School Poets Compete in GRAND SLAM FINALS for the 2016 World Champion DC Youth Slam Team!
Washington, DC -- Teen poets compete to represent the District on the world champion DC Youth Slam Team, a program of Split This Rock, Friday, March 18, 2016, 7 pm, at The Mead Center for Theatre, Home of Arena Stage, 1101 6th St, SW, Washington, DC. Tickets are $15 in advance at www.splitthisrock.org; $20 the day of the slam. In addition to two rounds of poetry performance by exceptional high school students, the Finals will also feature Individual World Poetry slam finalist and award-winning poet Rasheed Copeland.
On Saturday, March 18, 2016, a performance poetry competition will select the next team of teenage poets to represent the District at the international poetry competition Brave New Voices, held this year in Washington, DC. After months of practice, writing workshops, qualifying bouts, and inspiring performances in a grueling Semi-Finals competition at the National Portrait Gallery, the final eight student competitors have been selected for the 2016 GRAND SLAM FINALS. These students from all over the DC area have shown great talent, poise, and mastery of words in delivering their original poetry in the most moving and passionate manner.
Hundreds of young writers and performers from all around DC, Maryland, and Virginia have been working to make it to this year’s Finals, building a culture and community of literacy, art, and social change through after-school poetry clubs run by Split This Rock.
“Poetry is how I learned to love myself,” says 17-year-old poet Bobbi Johnson, of Bishop McNamara High School, who earned 1st place in Semi-Finals and will be competing in Finals. “If I looked out the window or to my peers and found no one who believed I mattered, I could look in my notebook and see it written. I mattered because I said so and the tangibility of ink and paper made it true for me. I have been writing myself into existence ever since. It’s how I cope with life.”
GRAND SLAM FINALS
Friday, March 18, 2016, 7pm
$15 advance tickets, $20 day of
Arena Stage – Mead Theater
1101 6th Street, SW
Washington, DC
Waterfront Metro
A program of Split This Rock, the DC Youth Slam Team uses spoken word poetry to teach and empower teens from the DC metropolitan area to speak up about issues of social justice. With free weekly writing workshops, monthly open mics, poetry slams, and annual travel to regional and national competitions, the team provides training and a platform for talented District youth to develop their poetry and public speaking skills with guidance from mentors and peers.