There were 1,656 press releases posted in the last 24 hours and 413,633 in the last 365 days.

POET Tree's Arbor Day Event recognizes students' creativity in writing (6/2/2011)

Five winning poems will be published in POET's Vital magazine


6/2/2011


Hundreds of students put pen to paper to participate in this year's POET Tree contest, with first place going to Clayton Vandenburg. Vandenburg, a fourth grader from Bedford, Iowa, submitted a poem describing what Arbor Day is all about: the tree.

The POET Tree contest challenged fourth and fifth grade students across the Midwest to write a poem about nature to celebrate Arbor Day and April as National Poetry Month. POET biorefinieries took part in this contest by reaching out to students in their communities.

Coming in second, Mikaylah Murphy, a fifth grader from Alexandria, Ind., also impressed judges with her poem about pollution and the environment.

Besides the poetry contest, POET helped students celebrate Arbor Day by planting trees at POET locations. With students' help, POET planted and distributed 6,325 trees. The event sought to teach students to take care of their environment.

From the POET Tree contest entries, five winners were chosen. Each received a Visa gift card and will have their poems published in the July issue of Vital magazine.

The other winners are as follows:
3rd place: Shelby McClain, Redkey, Ind.
4th place: Lauren Ganson, Marion, Ohio
5th place: Benjamin Reichenbach, North Manchester, Ind.

The winning poem by Clayton Vandenburg:
Tall skinny, short and round
Sometimes white, sometimes brown
Always giving, never complains
Doesn't like snow, Loves spring rains
Cleans the air, blocks the sun
Home for birds, we climb for fun
Can you guess what it is?
Do you know what it could be?
One of nature's greatest gifts,
It is… the tree.


About POET
POET, the largest ethanol producer in the world, is a leader in biorefining through its efficient, vertically integrated approach to production. The 23-year-old company produces more than 1.7 billion gallons of ethanol and 10 billion pounds of high-protein animal feed annually from 27 production facilities nationwide. POET also operates a pilot-scale cellulosic ethanol plant, which uses corn cobs, leaves, husk and some stalk as feedstock, and will commercialize the process in Emmetsburg, Iowa. For more information, visit http://www.poet.com.

# # #