{"id":381549,"date":"2022-12-14T06:06:14","date_gmt":"2022-12-13T20:06:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/?p=381549"},"modified":"2022-12-14T06:06:14","modified_gmt":"2022-12-13T20:06:14","slug":"sablan-sikkel-win-vfw-contests","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/sablan-sikkel-win-vfw-contests\/","title":{"rendered":"Sablan, Sikkel win VFW contests"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>
Winners of the Veterans of Foreign Wars Voice of Democracy audio-essay and Patriot\u2019s Pen essay contests, from left, Audry Paige White, Serin Chung, Irin Chung, Phoenix Sapphire Gross, and VOD first-place winner Jesus T. Sablan pose for a photo with VFW Post 3457 commander Robert DeRocher last Monday night at an awards ceremony at the VFW Bar. Moshe Sikkel, who won first place in the Patriot\u2019s Pen essay contest, was not present at the ceremony. (LEIGH GASES)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Once again, Saipan International School students swept this year\u2019s Voice of Democracy and Patriot\u2019s Pen youth essay contest of the Veterans of Foreign Wars Post 3457, as announced last Monday at the VFW Bar.<\/p>\n

Jesus T. Sablan won first place in the VOD audio-essay for the fourth year in a row, while Serin Chung won second place, and Irin Chung won third place.<\/p>\n

Moshe Sikkel won first place in the Patriot\u2019s Pen youth essay contest, Audry Paige White won second place, and Phoenix Sapphire Gross won third place.<\/p>\n

First place for both contests received a $275 cash award along with a medal and a certificate, while second place received $190, a medal, and a certificate, and third place won $85, a medal, and a certificate as well.<\/p>\n

Sablan, a 16-year-old senior at SIS, described his repeated victories as a \u201cgreat opportunity.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI would like to thank Ms. [Kimberlee] Church for introducing VFW to me. She\u2019s actually the one that got me started. I just think that this competition is very competitive and very diverse, however, I\u2019m very grateful and proud that I\u2019ve won for all of my four years of [joining] and I\u2019m very excited.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sablan is a speech and debate participant in school and became interested in the VFW competition. \u201cI started writing and then I submitted it. I found out that I got first place and so in the following years just getting that first [place] really encouraged me to continue,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

Sikkel, a 13-year-old 8th grade student at SIS, was not present due to being in soccer practice, so his mother, Thu Tran, received his awards for him. She said of her son winning the award, \u201cI think it\u2019s great that Ms. [Kimberlee] Church is asking them to participate and asking them to write. I think it\u2019s a great experience for them to be a part of it and just to practice on their essay writing skills. And for Moshe to win is just the cherry on top.\u201d<\/p>\n

Robert DeRocher, commander of the VFW Post 3457, who announced the winners, said that everybody who competed \u201cturned in exemplary work. Everyone who turns something in should be very proud. It was a very tough decision for the judges. It was a tough competition.\u201d<\/p>\n

According to the VFW website, the Voice of Democracy audio-essay program provides high school students across the nation \u201cthe unique opportunity to express themselves in regards to a democratic and patriotic-themed recorded essay.\u201d<\/p>\n

VFW said that nearly 65,000 high schoolers in the U.S. submit their essays every year in hopes of earning their share of over $2 million in scholarship funds and other incentives awarded through the program. This year\u2019s VOD theme was, \u201cWhy is the veteran Important?\u201d<\/p>\n

The Patriot\u2019s Pen youth essay contest is another contest hosted by VFW posts for sixth to eighth-grade students nationwide. Around 165,000 middle schoolers submit their essays in hopes of earning their share of more than $1.4 million in state and national awards. This year, students had to write a 400- to 500-word essay on the theme, \u201cMy Pledge to Veterans.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Once again, Saipan International School students swept this year\u2019s Voice of Democracy and Patriot\u2019s Pen…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":25,"featured_media":381552,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[900],"tags":[6868],"class_list":["post-381549","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-featured","tag-vfw"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/381549","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/25"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=381549"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/381549\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/381552"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=381549"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=381549"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=381549"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}