On Thursday March 29, 2012, nine Upper School students competed in the 30th annual Spanish Poetry Contest held in Nichols Auditorium.

This year, 32 students from around the Bay Area participated.

Entitled after the great Romantic poet Gustavo Adolfo Bécquer, the contest had six levels, five ranging from the Spanish classes 1 through 5 and one for native Spanish speakers. Up to two students were allowed to represent a school at each level.

Nathan Dalal (9), Varun Mohan (10), Sindhu Ravuri (9), and Sharanya Haran (12) were first-place winners in Spanish 1, Spanish 2, Spanish 3, and Spanish 5 levels, respectively. Zareen Choudhury (10) placed second in Spanish 2, while Proteek Biswas (12) also placed second in Spanish 4. In Spanish 3, Rahul Jayaraman (9) received third place.

The Spanish department picked the Upper School’s competitors through one main audition. All Spanish students presented poems in class while some auditioned separately during a Wednesday lunch period, and the top two presenters in each level were chosen by the department faculty.

In 1997, Moss first started bringing Middle School students to the contest, begun 30 years ago by John Fernández, a teacher at Presentation High School. For the past three years, the Upper School has held the contest.

A previous Spanish student who is now taking French, Sharanya participated because she was approached by Spanish teacher Abel Olivas.

Sharanya’s poem, “El viaje definitivo,” by Juan Ramón Jiménez, helped her tie for first place at the Spanish 5 level.

“I already knew a lot of poems we learned from Spanish [class], and I had one that I really liked,” she said.

Students picked from a variety of poems to master from famous Spanish authors such as Nobel Prize winning writer Pablo Neruda.

“[The poetry contest is] a neat way for us to expose the students to the important writers of the language,” Spanish Teacher Diana Moss said.

At the contest, three judges from outside of school evaluated the students based on memorization, pronunciation, gestures, intonation and emphasis, voice, and pace.

Deborah Martinez, a current Spanish teacher from an outside school, explained why she enjoyed coming back for her third year as a judge. “You can tell their [souls were] poured into it,” she said about the students’ performances. “You can feel it. It’s not just the words, but it’s coming out in another way that we can’t measure.”

Students who came to cheer on their friends or simply enjoy the Spanish poetry enjoyed the competition and appreciated their peers’ efforts. “The amount of work the competitors put into it really paid off, [and] I generally found it very entertaining,” Samir Baz (10) said.