On Tuesday, April 8th, over 150 students from around Long Island attended Adelphi University’s annual Poetry Day, which included workshops, a student slam poetry reading, and a keynote address by the performer and writer Mike Albo – a nationally acclaimed poet who has published numerous novels, magazines, anthologies and web sites. At the end of the conference, Empress Helwig (see photo), a junior at the Waldorf School of Garden City, received an excellence in poetry award (junior division) for her poem “The Way You See a Rainbow,” which she presented on stage during the poetry slam. All the students took part in a small writing workshops.

Alexios Kritas, Waldorf’s high school English teacher and creative writing club advisor, said “I am incredibly proud of our students. Throughout the year, we examine poetry in our daily English classes as well as in the Main Lesson courses and these students applied their experiences in the classroom towards this fine achievement.” Main Lessons are seminar-type classes that are central to the high school student’s academic experience and are unique to Waldorf education. These courses meet every day and focus on a specific topic, in a defined sequence, for 4 week blocks of time. Among the English Main Lessons offered are Dante’s Inferno, Transcendentalism, and Russian Literature. The extended length of the Main Lesson enables students to approach the topic through many modalities, adding depth and breadth to their understanding.