Shirin Ghorbani, a second grader at Potomac Elementary School, won the state of Maryland's PTA Reflections art contest in the literature division with her story "Hoppy's Big Dream," and will now compete for the second time in two years at the national competition this summer.
Fourteen of Potomac Elementary’ s students placed at the Montgomery County level of the PTA Reflections Art Contest, and three of those students made state rankings.
This year’s national Reflections theme is “Believe, Dream, Inspire.” Students competed in six areas: dance, film, literature, musical composition, photography and the visual arts.
Winning at the state level were Shirin's sister, Shaadi Ghorbani and Henry Burd, fourth graders, for photography. These students competed with students from 33 other Montgomery County schools.
Winning at the county level for Potomac Elementary were: Kate Mizushima, Kindergarten, for photography; Ariana DeCamp and Christopher Lindsay, second grade, for photography; Elyssa Shenker, third grade, for music composition; Candace Wei, third grade, for visual arts; Caroline Burd, fourth grade, for dance composition; Henry Burd and Alexander Lindsay, fourth grade, for photography; Owen Gill, fourth grade, for visual arts; Sarim Haider and Nicholas Renzi, fourth grade, for music composition; and Amberly Wu, fifth grade, for dance composition.
The school has sponsored the national PTA Arts Reflections program for five years. The school is certified as a Kennedy Center CETA (Changing Education through The Arts) school, which integrates art with other content areas to engage and motivate students.