A recent Kankakee Community College graduate has earned a scholarship from Phi Theta Kappa honor society’s Nota Bene literary competition. Kelsey Gioja, a 2024 KCC graduate from Watseka, earned the Reynolds Scholarship and a $500 award for her short story, “Invisible.”
“I was really surprised when I learned I had won it and was really excited to hear others had enjoyed my story,” Gioja said. “It is a great honor to have my story published with Nota Bene and among all the other winners.”
“After joining PTK, I learned of the opportunity to send in creative writing as a chance to be published in Nota Bene and win a scholarship. I have loved writing for as long as I can remember and had been working on a short story I started in a creative writing course at KCC. I decided I might as well give it a shot and send in the story, but I wasn’t expecting much to come from it. I had a lot of encouragement from my professor Amy Porter, and I am very grateful to her for that.”
“Invisible” is about a girl who feels like she is growing apart from her best friend, Gioja said. “On their first day of high school, her friend starts ignoring her, and she begins to realize their friendship might not be what she always believed it was,” Gioja shared.
“PTK offers many scholarship opportunities, and it is always an honor to see one of our own students earn an award that carries such prestige,” said Jaclyn Montemayer, a KCC professor and co-sponsor of the college’s PTK chapter, Alpha Delta Eta.
The Nota Bene literary competition accepts entries from PTK members in the following categories: Poetry, short stories, essays, drama, and visual arts. Award recipients also have their works included in the “Nota Bene” anthology. Nota Bene is Latin for “note well.”
The 30th edition of Nota Bene will be published later this fall. It also will be online at www.ptk.org/nota-bene.<http://www.ptk.org/nota-bene.>
Gioja now attends Taylor University, in Upland, Indiana.