Redmond High Student Competes in Poetry Out Loud

Redmond High School senior Arianna Morris just returned from the state finals for the 2026 Poetry Out Loud contest. She’s the only student from Central Oregon to make it that far. Eleven high schoolers from around the state competed on Saturday, March 7. Morris read two poems: “To My Dear and Loving Husband” by Anne Bradstreet and “O Captain! My Captain!” by Walt Whitman. She selected the first poem as a nod to her boyfriend. The second poem held a deeper meaning for her.

“I picked it because it had a lot of depictions about father and child relationships and that was something I really wanted to focus on, because it was something I could tap into really easily, and it had a lot of double meanings that I could also play into. It was overall a poem that connected to me personally,” she told the Source.

Arianna Morris, fourth from the right, is the only student from Central Oregon in the Poetry Out Loud state finals. Credit: Oregon Arts Commission

Poetry Out Loud helps students master public speaking skills, build self-confidence and learn about literary history. In recognition of America’s 250^th anniversary, the program this year focused on poems that celebrate American history and culture. Since 2005, more than 4.5 million high school students nationwide have participated in Poetry Out Loud made possible by the Oregon Arts Commission, National Endowment for the Arts and regional arts agencies.

“You were graded on how you recite the poem, your memorization, your understanding of the poem, and overall, how you make the audience understand your poem,” Morris explains. “It’s a very much performance-based type of competition. It’s very similar to theater competitions.”

She has entered the contest four times and made it to state finals the past three years in a row. “I’m always nervous when performing,” she says. “I am a theatre kid and choir kid so I’ve performed in front of people before, except its kind of a completely different playing field at Poetry Out Loud. It’s a lot more of showing your understanding instead of performing a poem, which is what I believe was my greatest downfall is that I performed the poem. I didn’t show a lot of meaning of understanding which is mainly what they are looking for.”

Emma Keen, a junior from Oregon School for the Deaf, won this year’s competition and will go onto the national finals on April 27 in Washington, DC.

This article appears in the Source March 12, 2026.