Oyster River High School (ORHS) is full of creative minds. This year, the Scholastic Art and Writing awards recognized more than 50 pieces from ORHS, marking this year as the most awards received at ORHS.
The Scholastic Art and Writing Awards is a contest where students from the United States in grades 7-12 can submit their works of art and writing for the possibility of recognition. The three levels of recognition are Gold Key, Silver Key, and Honorable Mention. This is the third year the Scholastic Awards have been an official part of the art program at the school, ORHS art teacher Hettie Haudenschield says. She is very supportive of students submitting their art, saying, “the awards are growing, and the kids are growing with them.”
At ORHS, there is a lot of diversity in the submissions people received awards for. Art student Morgan Righini (‘27) won multiple Scholastic awards for various projects this year, including a ceramic lighthouse, and a self-portrait, which won a Gold Key. She shared her opinion on what she believes people should submit to the Scholastic awards. “Anything that you think is valuable, you should submit, regardless of what you think they’ll think,” she says. Righini believes that if something is important to an artist, they should submit it to Scholastic. “[Scholastic is] looking for personal voice. Make sure it’s very expressive of you,” Righini adds.
Lilly Smith (‘26), is an American Vision Award nominee this year for her art piece titled Heavy. According to Scholastic, the American Vision Award is a prestigious award that recognizes work that shows originality, skill, and personal artistic vision. In order to receive this award, hard work and extensive time go into the process.
Righini comments on the perseverance it takes to submit to the Scholastic awards. “I wanted to give up so many times [on my self-portrait], but Ms. H encouraged me to keep going,” she said. It takes a lot of work for the artists and writers at ORHS to create Scholastic-worthy projects. There is a process behind the scenes that not many people think about when they see these art pieces.
Jake Baver, ORHS writing lab teacher, shared a similar thought, where he believes that Scholastic award-level work is work that has been revised many times. “When you submit to Scholastic, you have to be really intentional about your work […] give yourself adequate time to go through the revision process. If you try to submit something you wrote the night before, chances are you’re not going to have that writing reach its full potential.” Baver comments on one of his previous students’ works, where she worked hard to make sure the writing she submitted was polished.
Often, even with all of the work put into a project, students may feel nervous to put their work out into the world. However, all of the students who won awards shared their encouragement to submit. Anya Shuba (‘26), received multiple awards for her art this year, and said, “in art, there’s a lot of questions of ‘is my art good enough?’ and ‘I don’t think I’ll win,’ but art can be perceived in so many different ways. My advice is to just go for it…even if you don’t win keys, it’s still worth it to enter. It’s a good opportunity to get your art out there.”
For the writers, Baver adds, “[submitting to Scholastic] is very much a ‘nothing ventured, nothing gained’ situation. You’re going to put stuff out into the world. It’s also a good trial run for if you want to be published.”
Haudenschield says, “there is some growth with entering this award. It’s hard to put yourself out there. I have seen kids recognize ‘oh, I’m pretty good at art actually,’ because of these awards.”
Evangeline Athearn (‘26) won an award for her photography this year and has similar advice to Shuba’s. “At the end of the day it doesn’t matter if you receive anything or not. Art is really subjective, so don’t feel upset […] definitely try [submitting]. I think everybody can create beautiful things and you just have to put yourself out there. Don’t be afraid to ask for help with opinions but also listen to your heart.”
Additionally, for the writing side of the Scholastic Awards, Baver wants to help students enter the contest. There are a few ORHS students who sent their writing in to Scholastic this year, but this side of the Scholastic Awards at ORHS is not as developed as the art awards side is. However, Baver said he plans to be proactive next school year, by advertising his help to students who are interested in entering the Scholastic Writing Awards. Baver says come to the writing lab for help with projects.
This year is only the beginning of large milestones for ORHS’s Scholastic Award winners, and many artists and authors have high hopes for the future.
For students interested in seeing these award-winning works of art, the Durham Public Library is hosting an ORHS Scholastic Art Exhibition on March 3rd, from 5-7pm.
-Riley Duggan
Artwork by Anya Shuba
Mouth of the River 
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