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Talented local children in State finals of national writing competition Local students Minh Coa and Helen Kempton have been named zone winners in the nation’s largest creative writing competition for children, ‘Nestlé Write Around Australia’. By Latrobe Shire Council - 5th October 2004 - Back to News Minh, a year five student at Albert Street Primary School, Moe; and Helen a year six student at Grey Street, Traralgon, were presented with their prizes at a special presentation today in the Council Chamber Room at the Traralgon Civic Centre. The Latrobe City Library Service has coordinated the program in the Gippsland area.
Latrobe City’s Deputy Mayor, Councillor Lisa Price, presented Minh and Helen with a certificate, a $500 Australian children’s book collection for their school library and a backpack crammed full of Nestlé goodies. Eighteen other finalists also received a personal certificate and backpack.
In congratulating the children on their creativity, Cr Price said it was a credit to all the children who participated in the program resulting in the most entries ever.
"In this, the tenth anniversary year of the competition, 38,417 stories were received nationwide and we’re delighted that Minh and Helen are going on to the State finals of the competition," Cr Price said.
"The competition has highlighted the work of many intelligent, articulate, imaginative and literate young Gippslanders. These young writers are living proof that literacy and literary skills are very much alive and well in Gippsland," Cr Price said.
"One of the great things about the ‘Nestlé Write Around Australia’ program is that it encourages creativity and imagination. I’m sure that whatever these young people choose to do with their lives in the future, creativity and imagination will play an important part," Cr Price added.
Zone coordinator, Noeline Grayden, from the Latrobe City Library Service, said the zone winners were chosen after a second round of judging in the competition, where all twenty zone finalists from the area either wrote a new story or polished their original one, following a creative writing workshop held by a published Australian author.
"Latrobe City Library Service played host to author Phil Kettle who held thirteen creative writing workshops at the library in July, including a half-day session for the zone finalists," Ms Grayden explained.
"Since the program began operating nationally, the extensive learning and prize component of Nestlé Write Around Australia has seen over half a million dollars worth of Australian children’s books given to school libraries throughout the country," Ms Grayden said.
"A total of 300,000 stories have been written and submitted by children from all corners of the country. Each year the State winners’ stories are published in an official story collection and the original manuscripts of all 960 Zone finalists are archived in the Mitchell Library at the State Library of NSW."
The stories of all the zone winners are published on the website www.writearound.com.au.
Nestlé Write Around Australia is a Nestlé Australia community initiative, developed to promote literacy and creative writing skills to upper primary school children and to encourage them to utilise the resources of public libraries. The program is coordinated nationally by the State Library of New South Wales and is supported by Victorian State Library and public libraries around Australia.
Source: www.gippsland.com Published by: news@gippsland.com
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