URSA Major

Publication of Moscow Junior High School

URSA, Moscow Junior High’s Literary Magazine, is a second-semester course.

Interested students apply for the course and include a piece of writing.

Here, students work as writers, editors and even recruiters for submissions.

Students were involved in every aspect of the publication of URSA.

Creative Writing is an elective, one semester course. In this course, students have the opportunity to sharpen their skills as writers while experimenting with different genres of writing, including but not limited to short story, memoir, creative non-fiction and poetry. Students also have the opportunity to practice various writing techniques such as exploding/shrinking a scene, character development, dialogue, experimentation with voice and copy change. Peer conferences and student-teacher conferences also help students gain editorial practice.

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Young Moscow writers make national magazine

MOSCOW -- Four short stories published in Moscow Junior High's Ursa Major magazine have been accepted by the national literary magazine Writes of Passage.

The stories are "Sunglasses" by Kasi Grzebielski, "He Smokes His Father's Death" by David Christiansen, "Relinquished Imagination" by Kate Phelps and "A Lifetime of Rescue" by Taly Bialostocki.

Two other stories from Ursa Major have been chosen in the National Writing Project as examples of exemplary student writing. These are "Corn on the Cob" by Kristen Klemesrud and "Another Necessity" by Marta Borkova.