Seventh-grade Edgewood Middle School students Maryam Anwar and Liam Everett were announced Thursday as local winners of the Veterans of Foreign Wars writing contest.
This is the sixth year Project Lead the Way teacher Abbi Richcreek’s students entered the writing contest. It was not a classroom or homework assignment for the class, but an invitation to go above and beyond, according to provided news release.
Past winners were Ellie Green, 2023; Lillian Dunbar, 2022; Gwen Bowman, 2021; Aeva Ashenfelter, 2020 and Haley Rodewald, 2019.
This year’s theme was “My Voice in America’s Democracy?” Students were asked to write a 300- to 400-word essay. The contest is held at the local, regional, state and national levels.
Richcreek said all the submissions were blind judged by the VFW Post 1126.
Robert Dockery, VFW Post 1126 community service representative, said the Post was impressed by both Maryam’s and Liam’s submissions. The local Post reached out to their district office for special permission to submit both entries for state-level consideration. They each received a $250 prize.
Liam said for the first 30 minutes after learning he was one of the winners of the contest, he was like “Oh, my gosh.” His mother, Lauren Everett, said Liam’s surprise lasted more like two hours. Lauren initially missed the call and was able to tell her son he won.
Maryam said she was surprise. She entered the contest and eventually forgot she had entered it. Her mother, Juveria Azher, said she was very proud of her daughter.