UB Students Win Poetry Competitions

BUFFALO, N.Y. -- Award-winning poetry in competitions sponsored by the UB Libraries and the Department English in the UB College of Arts and Sciences have earned four students cash prizes and honorable mentions.

Joey (Zhong Wen) Tsao, a sophomore from Brooklyn who plans to major in sociology, won the Academy of American Poets Poetry Prize of $100.

A certificate for honorable mention went to Kevin Grauke, a graduate student majoring in English from Buffalo. The judge in the competition, sponsored by the University Libraries, was Carl Dennis, professor of English.

Robin F. Brox, a junior English major from Buffalo, earned first place -- and a $100 prize -- in the Friends of the University Libraries Undergraduate Poetry Competition.

Honorable mention and a citation went to Tsao. The judge was Michael Basinski, assistant curator of the Poetry/Rare Books Collection.

Brox also won the $100 Scribblers Prize, sponsored by the English department. The prize was established in 1939 by the Scribbler's Club, which was organized in Buffalo in 1893 to encourage local women writers. It was a counterpart to the Press Club, which was not open to women. The judge for the Scribblers Prize was Stacy Hubbard, associate professor of English.

Kim Chmielewicz, a graduating senior from Buffalo with a major in clinical laboratory science from the School of Health Related Professions, won the Arthur Axelrod Memorial Award and a $100 prize.

The award was established in 1975 through the English department by Mr. and Mrs. Harold Axelrod of Kenmore, the parents of Arthur Axelrod, an undergraduate in the English department. The judge was Irving Feldman, SUNY Distinguished Professor in the Department of English.