“Writings on the Wall,” the high-school’s literary-art magazine, won first place in the American Scholastic Press Association’s prestigious annual magazine contest. English teacher Kelly Kays, the Lit Mag advisor, submitted the publication to Scholastic for award consideration at the end of the 2021-2022 academic year and was notified about the award earlier this year, on Jan. 24.

“When I received the award, I was so proud of all the writers, artists and staff members who worked on that magazine,” Kays said. “All staff members, whether they submitted writing or art or helped read and choose the poems for publication, played a huge role in making the magazine successful.”

Kays noted that the staff worked hard all year to create the magazine. Over 150 submissions from hopeful writers and artists began pouring in as early as September. After the staff had made final selections for publication, they began the editing and layout process by mid-March, carefully pairing the proper artwork with each submission, in order to meet a final distribution deadline of early June.

The dedication and hard work of the magazine staff paid off when they received their award in January. However, Kays acknowledged that she and her current staff had no plans to rest on the laurels of last year’s award-winning team.

“We are always looking to improve the magazine,” Kays said. “With our first-place award we do receive a review with suggestions for improvement, so we take them into consideration for the following year.”

The following poem, “Raindrops” by Miro Kopiko ’23, is reprinted from the award-winning “Writings on the Wall.”

Raindrops

standing in the rain

 the water droplets fall

 landing on my face

 my thoughts swirl of you

 the rain starts to slow

 my heart began to race

wishing you, my sun

instead of the slow rain

was kissing my face

To access the entire publication, which includes over 30 poems and artwork, click on the following link.

https://www.rtnj.org/our-schools/randolph-high-school/literary-art-magazine