A junior from the Mississippi School for Math and Science is the 2015 winner of Mississippi's Poetry Out Loud competition.
Joy Carino recites the poem "To David, About His Education" by Howard Nemerov to win this year's Mississippi Poetry Out Loud competition. Carino said the poem's message relates to her experience at school.
"I chose it because it makes fun of education like you have to learn all these useful and visible things," Carino said. "You have to learn them because you still have to go to school and sometimes I feel that way, like I connect with the message of it."
Carino beat out eight other competitors to win the state title yesterday. Ken Bolinsky the State Coordinator for Poetry Out Loud said the program helps students with their public speaking skills.
"Anytime we get people talking in front of other people it improves their ability to talk in front of other people," Bolinsky said. "This is a great opportunity for them because they are not using their own words, they are trying to bring meaning through the words of others."
This is Joy Carino’s second year to win the state championship. She said preparing for the competition takes a lot of practice.
"I just practice them with my teacher and I also practice it with the theatre teacher on campus," Carino said. "I just basically just do it over and over until you find something that makes sense, and ask other people what they think about it and do what feels right."
Carino will be heading to Washington, D.C. in April to represent Mississippi in the National Poetry Out Loud competition. The state's 2012 winner went on to win the national poetry competition.
