In November 2019, 46 IMSA Russian 2 and 3 students participated in the 38th Annual National Russian Essay Contest, sponsored by the American Council of Teachers of Russian. Students wrote for two hours in Russian on the topic “Work, profession, and career in my life.” 1,333 students nationwide entered the contest this year. All IMSA students were awarded medals and certificates. IMSA students of Russian dominated the contest, winning 21% of the gold medals awarded at the Advanced level and 20% of the gold medals at the Intermediate level. The gold medal essays at the Advanced level were forwarded to the Pushkin Institute in Moscow for a second round of judging.
Here are the individual first round results:
Advanced Gold
Grace Federici (DeKalb), Maximillian Hellrung (Troy), Ishanpepe Jagusah (Rock Island), Lily Levrault (Mascoutah), Marcus Ludwig (Danville), Angela Wang (Darien)
Advanced Silver
Mohamad Hasan Almousawi (Bolingbrook), Alexander Bantchev (Peoria), Wyatt Funkhouser (Metropolis), Jerry Hong (Forsyth), Isabella Huynh-Pham (Lansing), Preet Kalaria (Mokena),
Linda Kaneps (Chicago), Ryan Talusan (Orland Hills)
Advanced Bronze
Rhiannon Davids (Kirkland), Rylie Meek (Jacksonville), Roman Putnam (Lindenhurst), Samuel Rabideau (Freeport), Alisa Williams (Chicago)
Intermediate Gold
Alejandro Carrillo (Antioch), Olivia Dambrauskas (Sandwich), Matthew Dinwiddie (Amboy), Madeline Fields Halva (Marion), Jonathan Gao (Makanda), Evelyn Lee (Vernon Hills), Julianna
Padilla (Elgin), Madhav Parthasarathy (Palatine), Shambhavi Punjala (Schaumburg), Charles Schreiber (Woodridge), Krystian Szczech (Norridge)
Intermediate Silver
Amanda Chen (Dunlap), Mirella Eldridge (Peoria), Rachna Gupta (Hoffman Estates), Samantha Hall (Woodridge), Alex Krysiuk (Crystal Lake), Xiaofan Li (Edwards), Kailey Light (Aurora),
Marcail McBride (Minooka), Eric Pan (Hoffman Estates), Victoria Shepherd (Butler), Sabirah Taiwo (Palos Heights), Michael Trombetta (Orland Park)
Intermediate Bronze
Shae Burnham (Batavia), James Guo (North Aurora), Ashwath Ramesh (Bloomington)
Intermediate Honorable Mention
Daniel Lee (Champaign)
Congratulations to all students who participated!
