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Four Henrico County Public Schools students have been recognized in the 2022 edition of the Scholastic Art and Writing Awards. The HCPS winners were selected from more than 260,000 entries throughout the U.S. and Canada, a 25% increase in entries compared with 2021.
Three of the students will be recognized at a June ceremony in New York City. All are eligible for publication in national print and online collections, as well as nomination for top college scholarship opportunities.
Three students at the Center for the Arts at Henrico High School won awards for visual arts entries, and a Mills Godwin High School student won two medals for poetry in the writing portion of the competition.
Andrew Palmer of the Center for the Arts won the nation's top award for his senior portfolio, titled “Blackness in Frame.” Of the hundreds of winning portfolio entries from regions across the country, only 11 students were recognized with a Gold Key Portfolio award. He will be published in a national publication, will participate in a virtual panel in May and will receive a $10,000 scholarship. Including Palmer, HCPS’ Center for the Arts has had four of the 75 national portfolio winners since 2014 — more than 5% of all winners in the U.S. and Canada during that time.
Cameryn McNeil, also a Center for the Arts student, was a Gold Key visual arts winner for “Loc’d.” She was one of only a handful of students in the commonwealth to win in the Digital Art category.
Jordyn Johnson of the Center for the Arts won a silver medal in the Comic Arts category for “A Trip to the Museum.”
Mia Tan, a senior at Mills Godwin High School, won twice in the writing competition's poetry category, taking home a gold medal for "A Sister's Departure" and a silver medal for "Bedside Promises."
Palmer, McNeil and Tan are among a select group of students who will travel to New York City be honored at a special ceremony June 8 at Carnegie Hall.
The competition, sponsored by the nonprofit Alliance for Young Artists & Writers, is the nation’s longest-running recognition program for creative teens.
