May 8, 2025
The Academies celebrated another year of the Oakland University Public School Academy Book Writing Contest for National Reading Month. The annual contest serves to encourage student’s creativity and showcase their writing and illustration skills. This year’s winners wrote and illustrated a story about their own personal and unique family traditions. The students explored their family traditions through their culture, family history, environment and upbringing, showcasing a diversity of perspectives. Their stories showed the importance of cultural and religious identity carrying traditions from generation to generation.
The winning titles from each academy include: Henna Parties by Noor Mohammed and My Family Traditions by Lamar Albana at Universal Academy,Open Pot by Jayden Green at Detroit Edison Public School Academy Ber Months by Erich Lee at Caniff Liberty Academy, Sunday Dinner by Darriq Norman at Detroit Academy of Arts and Sciences and Dollar Store Tradition by Jaila Cole at Dove Academy.
The student winners were presented with their awards by staff members of the Public School Academy office at their school’s board meetings and classrooms. Universal Academy held its yearly school assembly to honor their winner, Lamar Albana from class 5A and Noor Mohamed from class 5B, inviting their family, staff, classmates and the PSA office team to celebrate their great achievement. Each winner of the contest received a gift bag with a certificate and a hardcover copy of their own book for them to keep. Congratulations to all the student writers for another outstanding year of the book writing competition!
