Senior Eva Levin could not have been happier when she was selected as a Gold Key Portfolio finalist for the Scholastic Art and Writing Awards.

“I just couldn’t believe it!” Levin said with a laugh. “I was really excited and it was a total surprise.”

The Scholastic Art and Writing Awards is a national competition that recognizes early creativity in teenage students and offers scholarship opportunities to graduating high school seniors. Entry categories range from the visual arts to writing.

Levin chose to enter the Photography Portfolio division, a choice that would later open a world of opportunities to her.

“Photography is my passion; it’s what I want to do with my life,” Levin said.

Street photography is Levin’s preferred style. Usually done in black and white, street photography, as Levin explains, “captures and documents the outside world.”

Her favorite photography entry for the competition reflects just that.

“It’s a photograph of three Chinese children I saw at a park in Sunny Isles. They’re sitting on the ground, and one of them is looking up and staring directly at the camera,” Levin said. “It just shows the diversity of the area and life.”

If Levin wins the $10,000 scholarship grant when she flies to New York in July for the final judging, she says she would attend the International Center of Photography in Manhattan. She hopes to one day photograph for National Geographic.

Along with Levin, the entire AP Photography class entered. Everton Allen won High Honors in the Silver Key award while other students won local awards and merit honors.

Kelly Baron, Chantel Beato, Blaize Buck, Julienne Duverny, Katie Kupferberg and Stephanie Mack won local merit honors and had their work featured at the Miami Art Museum.

Junior Jessica Cohn-Kleinberg started writing her entry for the writing division of the competition last year. When she found out that her piece was a top consideration in winning a Gold Key, Cohn-Kleinberg did the first thing that came to mind.

“I started screaming and jumping around for half an hour,” she said.

Her original play, “In Between,” is about a woman who dies and is forced to defend her life in a courtroom located in purgatory. The jury is to decide whether she is innocent and granted access to Heaven, or guilty and sent to Hell. In the end, the woman is found guilty and sentenced to Hell. Ironically, Hell turns out to be Earth and the woman is given a second chance to redeem herself and make it into Heaven.

“I wanted people to read my play and question their own beliefs,” Cohn-Kleinberg said.

Cohn-Kleinberg already had one of her productions featured at the Broward Center of Performing Arts.

English teacher Melissa Keller stresses the importance of students entering competitions like the Scholastic Art and Writing competition.

“A competition provides opportunities for students to be rewarded for their talent,” Keller explained. “They’ll get exposed to life beyond the classroom, and winning or placing in a competition such as this one looks very impressive on college applications.”