Slam Poets Share Their Stuff

Upper School slam poets shared the activities of the Poetry Slam club, their process as writers and their recent accomplishments at a Morning Ex.

Student poems punctuated a presentation featuring students speaking about the Saturday mornings they spent at school as a team, refining their work with 8th grade English teacher and advisor David Fuder and former slam poet and alumnus Molly Kuhlman ’09.

One team member compared and contrasted visuals of conventional written poetry with a piece they developed for sharing at a Slam Poetry event. Another slam poet shared their process for revising a piece from a kernel of an idea to a more fully developed work. A team member then spoke about the team’s recent experience competing at the Rooted & Radical poetry festival, where three of Parker’s poets won awards and advanced in competition!

Junior Uma Morris was voted an All-Star Poet and advanced to semifinals. Junior Gabriel Vilus received the Jean Baptiste Point-DuSable award and performed his poem at the Finals Showcase. Freshman Beatrix Hirsch received the Mild Sauce on the Side award and shared her poem at the Finals Showcase as well.

Hirsch, Morris and Vilus then performed their award-winning pieces for the MX audience before fielding student questions, ranging from where the poets got their inspiration and when they found time to write, to which poets they enjoyed reading and more.

Enjoy photos from this experience here or a video below.