Tackling the subject "From Prejudice to Genocide," Amanda Ramic, a student at Plainview-Old Bethpage Middle School, was awarded Honorable Mention, for her submission, Prejudice Bosnia, by The Holocaust Memorial and Educational Center of Nassau County.

Each year, students from Nassau, Suffolk and Queens are invited by the center to participate in the Annual Literary Contest which encourages students to express their feelings through prose and poetry, on the theme: "From Prejudice to Genocide." This year, over 200 students, parents and teachers attended the ceremony. During the past year, many of these students visited the center to hear and see the history of the Holocaust through words, photographs, videos and testimony of survivors and/or liberators. Follow up discussions were held both at the center and in their classrooms.

The students' writings were read by two panels of judges. The first panel chose which entries qualified for final judging. This year's final judges were: Eve Feldman an author; Dr. Sharon Leder, associative professor of English at Nassau Community College; and Dr. Marcia Posner, the center's librarian, who then selected the top winners and honorable mentions.

In poems and prose, the students described cruelty by one group against another and expressed their desire for tolerance and understanding. Some students' families had fallen victim to terror in faraway lands, and, therefore, have learned that prejudice is not only found in other countries, but also exists all around us and within us, and that we must guard against it. Many entries caused tears in the eyes of judges and brought back tragic memories. Other words ended in hope and triumph. We are proud of the students and teachers who contributed to this moving and exceptionally well-written collection of prose and poetry.

On Sunday, April 30, students whose work won a first, second, or third prize in prose or poetry, or who were awarded an "honorable mention," gathered at the center together with their parents and teachers, to receive a copy of the Center's fifth annual book entitled Poems and Prose on "From Prejudice to Genocide," a compilation of their work, a certificate, and our top prize winners received United States Saving Bonds.

Plainview-Old Bethpage JFK High School students Andrew Klayman, grade 11, and Jenna Krostich, grade 10, students in the Advertising Agency Class, are to be congratulated for their winning entries in the Ads by Kids 2000 competition sponsored by Newsday.

After studying the principles of newspaper advertising, the students had approximately two weeks to design a newspaper advertisement for an actual Newsday client. The students designed ads for Millennium Toyota in Hempstead and Amity Toyota in Amityville.

The clients submitted advertising specifications indicating the parameters they wanted used in the ads. Students then developed their own creative ideas for an ad that would "get the message across." The clients then selected the "winning" entries. The winning ads were published in Newsday on Sunday, March 26.