A guard on CJ’s basketball team, she had come off the bench to play Friday night during her team’s eventual 36-34 loss to Alter in a state prep tournament game at Springfield. Shifting her attention to the state’s Poetry Out Loud contest the next day was an emotional challenge.
“It was real hard, especially after the loss. But I just had to focus,”Strahorn said. “I knew what I had to do. I just had to go out and do it.”
She had competed in the state poetry-reciting event last year and finished third, so she knew what to expect. She had also been preparing in recent weeks with coaching from Herb Martin, a poetry recital judge at CJ and parent of one of the school’s former students.
Strahorn recited three poems Saturday. She won with her final-round recital of “For Love,” by the late Robert Creeley.
Twenty-eight students competed in the state event Saturday, including representatives of Alter, Beavercreek, Fairmont, Northmont and Trotwood high schools and Dayton Early College Academy.
Strahorn, as the winner of Ohio’s event, earned the right to compete in the national Poetry Out Loud contest April 26-27 at George Washington University, going up against students from the other 49 states, the District of Columbia and the U.S. Virgin Islands. The winner receives a $20,000 college scholarship.
“She’s devoted, she’s focused and she’s organized,” said Jim Brooks, an organizer of Chaminade Julienne’s poetry recital competition who was Strahorn’s teacher in an honors English class two years ago. “She’s a great student.”
Strahorn will follow in the footsteps of Rachel Chandler, who as a CJ senior in 2008 won the state Poetry Out Loud contest and competed in the national event.
Strahorn, the daughter of Kris and Derrick Strahorn of Harrison Twp., also plays soccer. She said she hopes to receive a scholarship from Cleveland State University and start preparing for a career as either a pediatrician or a child psychiatrist.
She is setting the pace for younger sister Rachel, who as an eighth-grader at Holy Angels School is already a student council president.
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