Louder Than a Bomb (LTAB), organized by the Young Chicago Authors, is a month long festival that recognizes and awards students for their poetry performances. In February, WY students Keyante Atch ’15, Lauren Moore’ 15, Donna Gary ’15 and many other Chicago students will gather in several spots around the Columbia College Campus to take part in this event.

Poet Kevin Coval created this festival in 2001. Most poets compete in LTAB not only for a chance to win, but also to have the opportunity to perform their hard work in front of an audience.

“Sure, ‘winning’ and advancing feels good, but the feeling of performing for audiences eager to listen to your truth…that means more to me than all the competitions in the world,” says competitor, Alfonzo Smith ’15.

The festival contestants usually start by forming their own team. According to the LTAB rules, each team must consist of eight members and two alternates to qualify. After forming a team, they’ll be able to progress through preliminary bouts, bouts being one event with 4 rounds. Every bout has 4 teams that will compete against each other.

“Performing poetry for the competition is an amazing experience. It’s the most nerve wrecking thing to stand up on a stage for the first time in front of people and expect to be judged…literally,” says Keyante Atch ’15.

After winning a few bouts, the teams will then go through Semi-Finals and then go to Finals. The winner then advances to Brave New Voices, a bigger competition which is said to take place at a different location every year. This year it will be held in San Francisco.

“It’s a televised production–kind of like Nationals,” explains poet Shelyse Opio ’15.

The 5 or 6 judges of this festival are always randomly picked. The team members go up individually and perform their 3 minute long piece (points are deducted if the performance is longer.) the judges then score the poem from a low score of 1 to the highest score of 10.

At the end, the lowest and highest scores are dropped, leaving the middle. These are then tallied up. The winners then move on to the next round.

“My favorite thing about LTAB is how it provides a platform to meet people with similar interests that I wouldn’t have met otherwise,” says Opio.

Every Tuesday there is an open mic at 6pm at 1180 N. Milwaukee Avenue for anyone who wants to perform.