Four WY students demonstrated their writing skills to professional playwright critiques this summer.  After three months of processing and judging, Deja Jenkins ’15 and Steve Maloy ’14 were named as winners for the Young Playwrights Festival (YPF) competition. Lanae Plaxico ’14 and Edward Yanez ‘14 were among the students  who were named as finalists.

YPF is a competition in which students from WY’s Creative Writing classes enter plays that they’ve written in order to get feedback from professionals. If they are named a winner, they are rewarded with a check from Pegasus, a professional theater company, and the opportunity to have their play staged by the company.

The process took about five months for students to write and revise their drafts. They spent a unit on plot and conflict. In early August, Pegasus emailed students who were invited to the Final Round Celebration. Winners were announced at the beginning of September.

“I carried a notebook with me and would write lines or short ideas about the play,” explains Maloy.

Afterwards they did peer reviews to get more opinions on their plays. During this time, they fixed up their plays and, confidently, sent their plays to the Pegasus Theater Company to be judged.

“Writing a 30 page play is no easy task,” says English teacher, James English.

Many admit that their unique plot and storyline may have been one of the reasons to be nominated as finalists.

“My play is a little morbid. It’s about a girl named Iris that’s in a coma,” says Jenkins.

However, most of the students say they had fun with writing these stories.

“It was a great experience,” admits Jenkins.