MSU Story ý winners spotlight strength, identity
Contact: Sarah Nicholas
STARKVILLE, Miss.—The winners of a statewide storytelling competition all hail from ý and received top prizes for their moving narratives of struggles, human triumph and finding identity through poetry.
Hosted by MSU, Story ý seeks work—written, oral or filmed— from the best collegiate storytellers in the Magnolia ý and is open to all students enrolled at one of Mississippi’s institutions of higher learning. Winners of the written and oral categories received $100, and the competition’s overall winner was named Master Storyteller and earned an additional $150.
Kamree Howard, a sophomore psychology major from Ellisville, was named 2024’s Master Storyteller and won first place in the written category for her story “Magnolia,” a nonfiction narrative about the effects of her parent’s divorce.
Second place was awarded to Evelin “Jo” Aguilar, a junior architecture major from Pearl, for her story “Master Plan,” a piece capturing the emotions of a college student seeking to explore himself but feeling tied to his familial responsibilities back home.
Samuel Hughes, a senior communication and Spanish double major from Biloxi, won third place for his “Saddiq Dzukogi: Exploring identity through poetry,” a profile of MSU faculty member Saddiq Dzukogi, an assistant professor of English and an acclaimed poet.
In the oral category, first place was awarded to Raylen Ladner, a senior communication major from Diamondhead, for her podcast “Crawfish,” an investigation into the crawfish industry in relation to climate change.
Visit or email ablount@comm.msstate.edu for more information about Story ý.
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