{"id":23395,"date":"2025-02-25T13:09:12","date_gmt":"2025-02-25T20:09:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/mancos-fantasy-creators-contest-encourages-students-to-find-creativity-in-their-medium\/"},"modified":"2026-03-30T22:35:09","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T04:35:09","slug":"mancos-fantasy-creators-contest-encourages-students-to-find-creativity-in-their-medium","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/mancos-fantasy-creators-contest-encourages-students-to-find-creativity-in-their-medium\/","title":{"rendered":"Mancos Fantasy Creators contest encourages students to find creativity in their medium"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"The
The Mancos school district recently announced that Mancos Marshal officer Jesse Minor will be the district\u2019s new school resource officer. (Mancos school district)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>\n

The Fantasy Creators visual arts and performing arts contest is in full swing at the Mancos school district, with only a few more days until submissions are closed. The fantasy-themed contest is a way to encourage students to find their creativity outside the classroom and in the medium of their choice, according to Mancos art teacher Alys Hansen.<\/p>\n

This is the contest\u2019s third year. The contest previously was held in the fall, but Hansen said decided to hold the contest in the spring this year.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe kids are all creators in some kind of way, and so I wanted to create the opportunity for them to make anything, whether it\u2019s spoken word poetry or short stories or dances or TikTok videos, doing something that falls under the theme,\u201d Hansen said.<\/p>\n

Last year, the theme was a \u201cmysteries of the deep\u201d theme, while the first year was science fiction. This year, the theme is fantasy.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt can be a really fun way to celebrate the kind of creations and creativity our kids have,\u201d Hansen said.<\/p>\n

Contest submissions will be accepted until March 4 at 4:30 p.m. Winners will be announced during the art show opening event March 13 at 5:30 p.m. Winners will receive prizes.<\/p>\n

Submissions may include stories, essays, poetry, artwork, sculpture, music records, notated music, monologues, and dance pieces. First through third place will be awarded in four categories \u2013 kindergarten through second grade, third through fifth grades, middle school and high school.<\/p>\n

A panel of judges will determine the winners, and student names will be blocked from the view of judges to ensure fairness.<\/p>\n

Hansen added that she is hoping to see more participation from high school students.<\/p>\n

\u201cRight now, I mostly have elementary entries. I don\u2019t have any high school, and I know I\u2019m going to be getting a whole bunch of middle school ones next week,\u201d Hansen said. \u201cThe high school I\u2019ve had a harder time getting to continually participate. We\u2019ll see what happens.\u201d<\/p>\n

Hansen mentioned that some of the prizes this year come from Blick Art Materials, and includes \u201cunique\u201d art supplies. Other prizes given out in the past include wireless headphones and local gift cards.<\/p>\n

Overall, feedback has been positive.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe feedback is that it\u2019s really fun,\u201d Hansen said. \u201cI\u2019ve heard from more parents that they love that their kids are excited about doing art outside of school and that they feel inspired by different topics.\u201d<\/p>\n

Students who participate are also given a separate area of the art show to display their entries.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019re on display with the rest of the art show, but they stand out because they\u2019re in a category all their own from having chosen to participate,\u201d Hansen said. \u201cThere\u2019s a lot of pride for having their work on the wall, even when they didn\u2019t win \u2026 it\u2019s also an opportunity to share creativity and creative thinking with others and just celebrate how much you (the students) like making things.\u201d<\/p>\n

Hansen added that she hopes this contest will help inspire students to keep creating and sharing their art with the world, noting that anyone can be an artist.<\/p>\n

\u201cI absolutely hope that they take that curiosity and creativity to just keep making. There\u2019s always a place where they can enter their artwork. There\u2019s always a place where they can be celebrated as artists,\u201d Hansen said. \u201cA huge part of what I want to celebrate is the intersection of all fields really coming together in a creative contest.\u201d<\/p>\n

Those with questions or in need of more information can contact Hansen at ahansen@mancosre6.org<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Contest will accept entries from Mancos school district students until March 4<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":15162,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[363,155,28,83,60,29],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-23395","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-arts","tag-education","tag-headlines","tag-mancos","tag-montezuma-county","tag-newsletter"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23395","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23395"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23395\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":78098,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23395\/revisions\/78098"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15162"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23395"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23395"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23395"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=23395"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}