Bensalem High School students in Alyssa Eisenmann’s 2022-23 English classes were recently honored for their hard work, creativity and imagination in the Young Writers Twisted Tales writing contest.
Out of the 16,000 entries received from schools throughout the country, BHS was named the first place school winner and earned the Young Writers Award of Excellence for having the most unique and captivating stories over all other school entries. On behalf of Young Writers, BHS was sent an award that will be displayed in the school.
Young Writers Twisted Tales is a mini-saga writing contest that students entered in October 2022 in Eisenmann’s class. Students were given the topic of looking at a villain from another angle and writing from their perspective in 100 words or less. All writers were given the freedom to choose their villain and the situation they wanted to write about, such as the origin story of the villain, what they do on a regular day, or why the villain thinks they are doing the right thing.
Students wrote about villains from Disney movies, TV shows, books, video games and even villains in real life. Out of 121 student entries from Eisenmann’s class, 106 student entries were accepted by Young Writers. Of those 106 stories, 59 BHS students were then published in the Young Writers literary magazine.
Eisenmann said she’s proud of her students for stepping out of their comfort zone to enter this contest, and pushing their thinking outside of the box.
The published students are: Lillian Alger-McCaffrey; Ella Alleva (Class of 2023); Adham Ammar; Raven Baker; Logan Bauer; Addison Bock; Tuana Cakir; Jessica Canizares (Class of 2023); Shu-Chen Chiang; Abigail Clark; Catherine Cosden; Madelyn Cowell; Viktoriia Daniuk; Elena Drinhouser; Alyssa Durkalec; Kadin Eloi; Luke Factor; Caleb Falade; Samirah Feliciano; Andrew Gasper; Jasmine George; Efrain Gonzalez; Lisbeth Gonzalez- Altamirano; Haley Groves; Kelis Harvey; Ibiza Houck; Musa Jakypbek; Danny Klein; Emily Le; Anthony Lineberger (Class of 2023); Ambrielle McCoy; Giovanni Micciolo; Jessica Ortega; Alma Padilla; Meet Patel; Sophia Peacock; Shiloh Peters; Brianna Pezza; Nick Plata; Alla Pogoretskaya; Yasir Port; Charlotte Querin; Kaitlynne Raymond; Lainey Rossiter; Kendra Rush; Lea Scott; Janicia Shaw; Michael Sit; Piper Strunk; Madison Thackeray; Ivy Tran; Mainor Villanueva; Ahmir Warrington; Madison Weldon; Christopher White; Maya White; Regis Williams; Steven Wise; Max Wiza.