United Arts of Wake County, in partnership with the Raleigh Fine Arts Society, celebrated the 12 finalists from the 2024 High School Spoken Word Contest. These finalists were honored at a celebratory reception on Jan. 28 at the North Carolina Museum of Art. During the event, the winners, First Place ($1,000): Josephine Geolas (first place), Kenna Zhang (second place) and Talia Favatella (third place) were announced and awarded prizes.

This article originally appeared in the March 2025 issue of WALTER magazine.