2015 College Poetry Competition

8th Annual College Poetry Competition Finalists’ Reading
Saturday, April 11, 2015      Worcester Public Library, Saxe Room

The Worcester County Poetry Association inaugurated the College Poetry Competition in 2008 to encourage and recognize the next generation of poets.  The finalists are nominated by faculty and administrators at colleges in Worcester County.

Submissions are judged for the Manuscript Prize and finalists are asked to perform one submitted poem for the Performance Prize.

Students compete for a cash award and a one-year WCPA membership in each category. The winning entry for the Manuscript Prize will be Fall 2015WCPA literary journal, The Worcester Review. 

Finalist Bios

Anna Maria College: Andrew Scott Farrar, Paxton, MA
I grew up in Paxton, Massachusetts, and moved away after high school to work and travel. After spending a couple of years in Boston, I moved back to Central Mass to return to my education. Reading and writing have always been definitive hobbies of mine, that along with traveling.

Assumption College: Sam Hutchings
Sam Hutchings is a Junior English Major, and has had several poems published in The Worcester Journal and Boston Review.

Clark University: Levi Byrne, Reading, PA
I was born in Reading, Pennsylvania and lived in several different states before coming to Massachusetts for college. Books and poetry have always been a huge part of my life, and I’ve experimented with writing various forms of poetry, short stories, and two novels.

College of the Holy Cross: Marianne Muro, Bolton, CT
Marianne Muro hails from Bolton, Connecticut. She is currently a senior at the College of the Holy Cross and will be graduating this spring with a B.A. in English and a minor in Education. Marianne plans to attend law school next year in pursuit of a degree in education law.

Fitchburg State University: Jonathan M. Berglind, Leominster, MA
Jonathan Berglind resides in Leominster Massachusetts. He is the production editor of Detour, an online zine run by students of Fitchburg State University. He is a Film/Video major with a minor in professional writing and wants to write screenplays and fiction professionally. Jonathan was unable to attend the finalist reading.

MCPHS University: Nora Elghazzawi, Newton, MA
I am a second year PharmD Student at MCPHS. I am studying to become a clinical Pharmacist with a specialty in Pediatrics. I am from Newton, Massachusetts, and went to Newton North High School.

WPI: Allison Indyk, Wappingers Falls, NY
Allison Indyk is a senior biomedical engineering student at Worcester Polytechnic Institute and plans to pursue a career as a physician in medicine. She uses writing as a way to stay connected to her values and creativity and uses it as a means to explore the human experience through such self expression.

Worcester State University: Sarah Leidhold, Acushnet, MA
Sarah Leidhold is a senior in the honors program at Worcester State University from Acushnet, Massachusetts. She is the winner of the Barbara Pilon Poetry Contest (2014) and third place in the Commonwealth Honors Project Competition for a chapbook of poems, “Superfluous Sincerity” (2014). An English and Education double major, Sarah is currently completing her teaching internship in Worcester while writing poems and book reviews.

Contest Judges

Liz Heath has been writing poetry for 17 years and performing for almost 10. She’s participated in slams, workshops, demo slams and school performances. She is an organizer for 7 Hills Slam, Worcester’s poetry slam venue. She’s self publicized 2 books of poetry (Re-arranging the Alphabet and This Is My Therapy). Her poetry talks about life, love, redefining beauty and raccoon men. She was a finalist in the first WCPA college poetry contest in 2008.

Of Abenaki and French Canadian heritage, Cheryl Savageau was born in central Massachusetts. She graduated from Clark University in Worcester, Massachusetts, and studied writing at the People’s Poets and Writers Workshop in Worcester. She is the author of the poetry collections Home Country (1992), Dirt Road Home: Poems (1995) nominated for the Pulitzer Prize, and Mother/Land (2006).

Contest Chair

Jim Cocola is an Assistant Professor of Literature, Film, and Media in the Department of Humanities and Arts at Worcester Polytechnic Institute, and has also served on the faculty of the Language and Thinking Program at Bard College. His essays and poems have appeared in publications including the minnesota review, n+1, Polis, VIA: Voices in Italian Americana, and The Worcester Review.