School students wanted for ‘Pens Against Poverty’

&NewLine;<p><img class&equals;" alignright size-full wp-image-314" style&equals;"margin&colon; 5px&semi; float&colon; right&semi;" src&equals;"http&colon;&sol;&sol;schoolnewsnz&period;fastrackdev&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2012&sol;03&sol;SN16-Pens&period;jpg" alt&equals;"SN16-Pens" width&equals;"200" height&equals;"150" &sol;>Intermediate students from around New Zealand are being asked to put pen to paper in a unique bid to help fight poverty in the developing world via an innovative scriptwriting challenge&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p> <&excl;--more--> <&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>ChildFund New Zealand has announced &&num;8216&semi;Pens Against Poverty&colon; ChildFund&&num;8217&semi;s Young Playwrights Challenge&&num;8217&semi; which offers year 6&comma; 7 and 8 students the opportunity to hone their literacy skills while helping raise awareness for a good cause&period; Participating students will gain valuable insight in to scriptwriting from actor&comma; playwright&comma; director and ChildFund Ambassador&comma; Alison Quigan&comma; who has set the scriptwriting criteria&period; The winning school receives expert guidance from across New Zealand&&num;8217&semi;s drama fraternity as their script is developed into a play for the professional stage&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>The initiative comes from the success of ChildFund&&num;8217&semi;s recently published children&&num;8217&semi;s book&comma; Mary&&num;8217&semi;s Christmas Yarn&comma; a warm-hearted tale of giving to those in need&comma; penned by 10 of New Zealand&&num;8217&semi;s best known storytellers&period; The book is to be used as the basis for the scripts submitted to the challenge&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Senior primary and intermediate schools nationwide have until 30 April to submit their best scripts and see if they have what it takes to craft a script worthy of the stage&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>The top five scripts will be selected in May by a panel of expert judges&comma; with each finalist school getting the opportunity to perform an excerpt from their script live to one of the judges and receive their professional critique&period; The overall winning script will have the honour of being transformed into a professional production&comma; staged by an Auckland drama group&comma; with a musical score developed by students from a secondary school&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>ChildFund CEO Paul Brown believes &&num;8216&semi;Pens Against Poverty&&num;8217&semi; is the first collaboration of its kind&comma; providing a unique&comma; real-life learning opportunity useful in meeting curriculum requirements for literacy in the classroom&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;