10 Youngstown Students Are Finalists in Essay Program

YOUNGSTOWN, Ohio – Ten Youngstown City School District students are finalists in the national Do the Write Thing program.

Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost recognized the students this week. His office works with the national program, which aims to empower young people to talk about violence in their communities and offer solutions.

“I know it’s not easy to write about violence,” Yost said in a video played at an awards event Tuesday. “But your essays were thoughtful, eye-opening, provocative – exactly what we need to learn from you, our young citizens, to give us a better understanding of the world you’d like to live in and how it looks now from your point of view.”

Youngstown City School District Superintendent Jeremy Batchelor praised the program for the opportunity it gives students to be heard.

“Our community has endured many devastating events on city streets that have given our scholars and their families a front-row seat to trauma and its aftermath,” he said. “Our scholars brought raw emotion and transparency to their writings. Their expressions have raised the level of understanding of the trauma in the community.”

The Do the Write Thing program started in Ohio in 2021 with Springfield City Schools and has since been adopted by Youngstown, Canton, Lima and Zanesville schools. This is the third year YCSD seventh and eighth graders have participated. 

The district received 600 submissions this year from students at Chaney, East and Rayen Early College middle schools.  

Business leaders and community members judged the essays, selecting 10 for publication in a booklet, which will be distributed statewide.

Students Treyvaughn Belmonte and Sheliyah Roach will represent the Youngstown district. They will join six students from the three other participating districts as Ohio’s ambassadors at the Do the Write Thing national conference in July in Washington, D.C.

Pictured at top: Front row, from left: Riley Green, Sheliyah Roach, Treyvaughn Belmonte and Jaydie Pena-Hernandez; and back row, from left: Anaiah Riddle Brown, Tristan Coleman, Angelica Rivera Martinez, Jaliyah Cundiff, Samrynn Minor and Angel Feliciano.

Published by The Business Journal, Youngstown, Ohio.