The Poetry Society of Texas has announced the 2010 winners in its annual statewide poetry competitions, and three of the honored poets are Timberview High School students. Among the three award winners is Kimberly Pimentel, one of only ten Texas high school students whose poem was chosen to represent the state in a national competition sponsored by the National Federation of State Poetry Societies.

Junior Victoria Valastro’s poem “Go Back to the Plains of Texas” was awarded second place in the Valerie Martin Bailey Award competition; Senior Pamela Torres was named third place poet in the Whitney M. Montgomery Award competition for her poem “Less Than Sweet Mystery.”

Freshman Kimberly Pimentel’s poem “First Glance” was named third place winner in competition for The Castle Prize and selected to be one of Texas’ entries for the 2011 Manningham Prize sponsored by the National Federation of Poetry Societies. She, Ms. Valastro, and Ms. Torres, have been invited to read their works at the Student Awards Festival sponsored by the Poetry Society of Texas on May 1 at the Dallas Public Library.

Earlier this school year, Ms. Pimentel was named one of eight finalists in the Red Steagall Cowboy Gathering Youth Poetry Contest when the runner-up poet was also a Timberview student. Sophomore Aquilah Davis’ poem “What kind of man” earned her second place and a scholarship to be applied to the school of her choice in the amount of full year’s tuition and fees at a Texas state community college. In five years of submitting poetry to this annual “cowboy poetry” competition, six Timberview poets have been named finalists, including Ms. Davis and Marissa Hall (2004) both runners-up and Elizabeth Cartledge first place scholarship winner in 2006.

This is the first year that Timberview poets have submitted entries in the Poetry Society of Texas’ annual contests. While they do not carry financial awards, these prestigious competitions recognize only the very best high school poetry in the state as judged by expert poets and critics.

Ms. Pimentel and Ms. Valastro recently attended the annual Way of Seeing Writers’ Conference in Santa Fe, New Mexico, sponsored by Jim Benton, Peter Downing, and Sarah Shelton of the Timberview High School Language Arts Department.