Tri-Valley Writers annual high school writing contest
“My Story, My Vision”
“It takes great courage for students to submit writing to strangers to evaluate and comment on it,” Tri-Valley Writers member Patricia Boyle said. “I’m proud of the students who entered the contest and took the risk of sharing their work.”
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2023 Award Winners by Category
Literary Nonfiction:
First Place: Natalie May for “The Creature and Me”
Second Place: Neil Chandran for “Toxic GPA: The Negative Impact of Obsessing over Grades”
Third Place: Elizabeth Popovich for “How to Pass Your Permit Test”
Honorable Mentions: Dorothee Catipon for “Growing Pains”; Ashray Pamula for “Addressing Political Polarization in a Time of Democratic Backsliding”; Nivedita Rao for “My Ten Thousand”; Lillie Woodard for “Disorder”
Poetry:
First Place: Sienna Wong for “If I’m Being Honest”
Second Place: Ishmeet Dhillon for “an ode to nani and nanu”
Third Place: Ananya Biswas for “Just Fine”
Honorable Mentions: Ishmeet Dhillon for “I Know Now”; Elizabeth Hong for “fifty”; Joshua Leung for “The Boy He Once Was”
Short Story:
First Place: Alyssa Wu for “Because”
Second Place: Saanvi Aneja for “Live”
Third Place: Kaylee Macias for “Lily of the Valley”
Honorable Mentions: Aditi Swaminathan for “The Stag in the Glen”; Alan Wan for “Death’s Greatest Lament”; Angela Zhang for “Self Portrait”
CWC Tri-Valley Branch congratulates these authors of tomorrow. We wish to thank the Alameda County Arts Commission, and the following donors for their support: Jordan Bernal, Patricia & James Boyle, Paula Chinick, Lani Longshore, Rose Owens, Marie-Anne Poudret, Kathy Urban, Anonymous TVW Donors.
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2022 Award Winners by Category
Literary Nonfiction
First Place: Prakriti Saxena for “How to Win a Fight with your Parents”
Second Place: Srija Nampally for “Gratitude”
Third Place: Natalie May for “All You Can Hope For”
HM: Gayathri Viswanath for “Climate Change: The Profitability of Human Suffering”
HM: Angelina Ge for “Finding the Outlier”
HM: Jessica Baker for “Legacy Ends Here”
HM: Emma Ka for “Winds”
Poetry
First Place: Annika Gangopadhyay for “Nautch Girl”
Second Place: Julia Vu for “duyên”
Third Place: Sarah Baer for “Alcoholic”
Third Place: Catherine Vuletic for “The Thing About Writing”
HM: Michelle Pan for “Finding Peace”
HM: Victoria Huang for “Bluebells Behind Our Ears”
HM: Annika Gangopadhyay for “Self Portrait as Luna”
Short Story Fiction
First Place: Jessica Jiang for “The Silent Voices”
Second Place: Sameer Dhanvantari for “The Horrifying Scourge of Being Addicted to Learning”
Third Place: Meghan Boyle for “A Fire Painted Sky”
HM: Serena Lei for “Sisters Forever”
HM: Sarah Ham for “The Reason”
HM: Alexandra (Alex) Hanin for “This Is How It Starts”
HM: Shriya Sridhar for “Senseless”
HM: Sneha Ganesh for “The Bus Stop”
HM: Yufei Xian for “The Girl I Loved to Hate”
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2021 Award Winners by Category:
Nonfiction
First place: Angelina Ge for “The Inferior Complex”
Second place: Juliana Muegge for “Rebounding from COVID-19: The Strength of Community and What the Numbers Don’t Say”
Third Place: Ananya Iyengar for “My Disney Ending”
Third Place: Jessica Bakar for “Scar Story: Revisited”
HM: Rohan Chandran for “Keeping Down the Negativity”
HM: Natalie May for “Mystery Diners, Overthought”
HM: Anusri Saraf for “my cup of chai”
HM: Risha Chakraborty for “Death and Dichotomy: America’s Hybrid Health System Must Go”
HM: Michelle Liu for “Moving On: Closure”
HM: Awva Bashiri for “The Perpetual Pawn”
Poetry
First Place: Claire McNerney for “possum poem”
Second Place: Amala Rao for “But for One Small Difference”
Third Place: Christopher Pak for “The Red Sea”
HM: Musa Sayed for “Problem Solved?”
HM: Mikayla Marinko for “Not All Men”
HM: Sydney Gong for “Outsider”
HM: Angelina Ge for “Wonderland”
Short Story Fiction
First Place: Emma Ka for “Floating Candles”
Second Place: Miranda Duarte for “I Love You for Sentimental Reasons”
Third Place: Brian Guan for “The Hunter”
HM: Meghan Boyle for “Always”
HM: Lisa Levinson for “Butterflies”
HM: Aiden Rim for “My Promise”
HM: Setareh Salkhi for “On Valentine’s”
HM: Brenna McCord for “The Colors of Death”
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2020 Award Winners by Category
Nonfiction
First place: Smriti Davey for “Slow Down”
First place: Jessica Luan for “The Da Jie Agenda: How I Learned to Embrace My Sea Sponge Siblings”
Third Place: Rohan Chandran for “Rebel with a Cause”
HM: Sanjana Bhanvadia for “The Story of My Life”
HM: Madeline Day for “What I Remember”
HM: Ananya Iyengar for “Tug of War”
HM: Elaine Yang for “Monkey”
HM: Simoni Regmi for “Inforgettable Road Trip”
HM: Rahul Almeida for “My Passion”
HM: Nivriti Krishnamurthy for “The Taste of Home”
Poetry
First Place: Kanchan Naik for “To Proud Boys”
Second Place: Kanchan Naik for “A Postcard from Mumbai”
Third Place: Mikayla Marinko for “Depression”
HM: Eva Shen for “Self-Portrait as a Tree”
HM: Vivien Song for “Letters from the Kitchen Pantry”
HM: Calvin Shawler for “Twenty Seconds”
Short Story Fiction
First Place: Kirin Yadav for “The Girl Who Grew Dragon Wings”
Second Place: Macie Calvert for “Ferryman”
Third Place: Roshni Aradya for “The Revolutionary”
HM: Soumya Sahay for “Silent Soft Strokes Scare Me to Sleep”
HM: Myrsini SAn Marchi for “Tale of the Trees”
HM: Kylie Jones for “House of Mirrors”
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2019 Award Winners by Category
Essay
First place: Lipi Buch for “A Eulogy for Insecurity”
First place: Katherine Mudge for “I’m Uncomfortable”
Third Place: Jacob Zhou for “Stars”
HM: Neha Prasad for “The Force”
HM: Anika Nicolas for “National Parks are Worth Preserving”
HM: Shangxi Wu for “How I Built Up Confidence to Speak in Public”
Poetry
First Place: Anna Chuang for “To Be Thin”
Second Place: Claire McNerney for “phased”
Third Place: Connor Diaz for “Aggravated”
HM: Melanie Kim for “The Great Beasts”
HM: Gita Supramaniam for “Wherefore Art Thou Unpredictable”
Short Story Fiction
First Place: Arushi Avachat for “California”
Second Place: Anjali Zyla for “Imagining Us”
Third Place: Anna Niu for “the inevitable passage of time”
HM: Eva Shen for “Lost Translation”
HM: Nisreen Hitti for “Tomorrow”
HM: Nirajara Dungwatanawanich for “Fear”
HM: Jennifer Huang for “Words I Didn’t Say”
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2018 Award Winners by Category
Essay
First place: Nivriti Krishnamurthy for “The Bird That Showed Me Beauty”
First place: Meghna Pamula for “The Permanence of Plastic”
Third Place: Arushi Avachat for “of honey and spice”
HM: Ananya Varshneya for “In My Eyes”
Poetry
First Place: Melanie Kim for “The Colors of Jingxi”
Second Place: Annie Pollak for “Years”
Third Place: Jill Lee for “missing april showers, missing may girl”
HM: Yuwei Dou for “Bike Riding”
Short Story Fiction
First Place: Yuwei Dou for “Becoming Nancy”
Second Place: Chloe Jeon for “The Silver Brooch”
Third Place: Janice Liu for “Cherish”
HM: Cassidy Cheng for “The Real Award”
HM: Alison Wu for “Leafless Trees”
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2017 Award Winners by Category
Essay
First place: Charlotte Miranda for “Bird Girl”
First place: Kyeling Ong for “History in the Making”
Third Place: Tiffany Jing for “Hide and Seek”
HM: Crystal Wu for “Living Under the Moon”
HM: Fiona DeBernardi for “The Gamble”
HM: Luisa Taverna for “My Secret Journey”
HM: Rachel Lam for “Breaking Out of Water”
Poetry
First Place: Vidhima Shetty for “When the Home No Longer Talks of Love”
Second Place: Saima Yunus for “Make Knowledge, Not War”
Third Place: Neha Harpanhalli for “The Fence on Pickett Street”
Third Place: Jill Lee for “not that little”
HM: Jack Dalisa for “Ode to Hard Work”
HM: Cianna Book for “Pretty Little Addict”
HM: Savita Pereira for “Damsel in Distress”
HM: Michelle Morris for “The Deadly Dream of Bartie B”
HM: Shangxi Wu for “Skateboard”
Short Story Fiction
First Place: Anna Niu for “love you like a delusion”
Second Place: Arushi Avachat for “Pinky Promises”
Third Place: Cecil Choi for “Character”
HM: Isabella Herndon for “Pharmacophobia”
HM: Savita Pereira for “The Butler Did It”
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2016 Award Winners by Category
Essay
First place: Quincy Kumfert for “Trust Fall”
Second place: Alyssa Purdy for “May 18th”
Third Place: Tiffany Jing for “A Golden Christmas”
HM: Charlotte Armstrong for “How to Learn the Worldwide Language”
HM: Gemma Brunton for “Family Vacation”
HM: Augustin Chen for “Learning from the Grim Reaper”
HM: Luisa Taverna for “My Walk Across the Street”
Poetry
First Place: Katelyn Hefter for “Sol – Lucky Stars”
Second Place: Kayla Claudino for “Driving”
Third Place: Bear Goodson for “The Necklace She Gave Me”
HM: Neha Harpanhalli for “The Orchard”
Short Story Fiction
First Place: Nick Massie for “The Battle of Big Red Barn”
Second Place: Tala Endacott for “My Therapist Told Me to Write About It”
Third Place: Madeline Madrigal for “Isaac”
HM: Maya Brunell for “Truth, Even for the Highest of Prices”
HM: Emily Ellis for “The Edge”
HM: Ashwathi Nair for “The Boy Who Cried Shoes”
HM: Sarah Shin for “The Union”
HM: Alexandra Stassinopoulos for “Schizo-friendic”
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2015 Winners by Category
Essay:
First Place: Anjali Vadhri for “Musings of the Other Child”
Second Place: Vani Lee for “Going Back into Nature”
Third Place: Pondharshini Sadasivam for “A Memory That Grows”
HM: Abigail Vogeley for “The Tom Touch”
HM: Will Kim for “A Gamer’s Story”
HM: Emily Chuah for “I Have a Superpower”
Poetry:
First Place: Spoorthi Vittaladevuni for “Etched Words”
Second Place: Hannah Binder for “Forgiving My Father”
Third Place: Noah Yan for “Father to Son”
HM: Casey Overfield for “The Boy”
HM: Laura Augustinsky for “Encroachment”
HM: Alexis Trujillo for “Monster’s Magic Mushroom”
HM: Belle Goodson for “Sheets of Rain”
Short Story Fiction:
First Place: Miranda Tan for “Shattered Mirrors”
Second Place: Megan Do for “Short Skirts”
Third Place: Tegan Borg for “An Exploration of Destiny”
HM: Angelica Hom for “Death is Hungry”
HM: Aashna Avachat for “The Last Man on Earth”
HM: Ingrid Lam for “Out, Out and Away”
HM: Reilly Olson for “Igor”
Booktrack: Putting music and sound effects to words.
First Place Poetry: Stephen Baker for “Sweet Song Sway”
First Place Short Story: Jonathan Meyers for “My True Love”
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2015 Winners by Category
Essay:
First Place: Annie Chen for “Star by Star”
Second Place: Hannah Keihl for “The Little Theatre”
Poetry:
First Place: Megan Chin for “Skeleton”
Second Place: Maya Lyubomirsky for “Brew”
Third Place: Maya Lyubomirsky for “The Meaning of Life”
HM: Jessica Heimann for “I Walked On”
HM: Christina Ge for “The Red Fruit of Summer”
HM: Nabeel Mamoon for “So Falls the Rain”
Short Story Fiction:
First Place: Jhinuk Barman for “Life is a Paradigm”
Second Place: Tomi Tunrarebi for “Burning Film”
Third Place: Jacob Smith for “The Grocery List”
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2013 Winners by Category
Fiction
First Place: Jacob Smith for“A Shadow’s Release”
Second Place: Megan Chin for“Speak Out”
Third Place: Lindsay Virgilio for“Diamond Horizon”
HM: Jonathan Dadgari for “Here Be Dragons”
HM: Lauren Furman for “Nowhere”
HM: Seddon Malchoz for “Pizza and Psychiatry”
HM: Waverly Runion for “Wanderer”
Poetry
First Place: Kevin Yang for “Sentry of the Desert”
Second Place: Waverly Runion for“The Working Class”
Third Place: Tchantz Ravazza for “Time”
HM: Alsion Spencer for “Footsteps”
HM: Gautam Ramesh for “His Castle”
HM: Andrea Ludwig for “Just One Year”
HM: Joelle Victoriano for “Obesity – Open ’til Midnight or Later”
HM: Jessica Sher for “Paranoid”
Essay
First Place: Tiffany Kwan for “Oasis”
Second Place: Phonharshini Sadasivam for “What is India to Me (Who Am I?)”
Third Place: Alexandra Gladchenko for “Sunset”
HMs: Katie Chan for “Helping Janet” and “The Three No’s,”
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2012 Winners by Category
Poetry
First Place: Hans Lee for “Book’s Dream”
Second Place: Enikoe Bihari for “Oblivious”
Third Place: Enikoe Bihari for “Moonslaves”
HM: Jazmin Almeida for “Hang Your Raincoat on the Moon”
HM: Brenna Botzheim for “I Can See the Stars”
HM: Jessica Wright for “Cries of a Sober Teenager”
HM: Tiffany Zheng for “Like Fireflies”.
Essay
First Place: Ke Zhao for “Glass Hearts”
Second Place: Katie Chan for “Mommy and Baba”
Third Place: Kristie Becker for “Broken Butterflies”
HM: Tori Knuppe for “A Sculpted Child”
HM: Maekhila Koppikar for “Shades of Gray”
HM: Hayley Revells for “The Piano Keys”
HM: Aryo Sorayya for “The Chains of Man”
HM: Ke Zha for “Kaleidoscope”.
Fiction
First Place: Claire Zasso for “Crash”
Second Place: Angie Kang for “You Know”
Third Place: Nick Livson for “The First Storm”
HM: Tiuli Kulshi for “Escape”
HM: Tarun Reddy for “Across the World in a Second”
HM: Sijing Xie for “Curious George”
HM: Qianying Zhang for “Regaining Her Balance”