March 19, 2003
ARKADELPHIA – Mix a classroom assignment, a family pet and a spouse’s suggestion, and what do you have? In Shelia Ruth’s case, it’s a chance to win a $250 higher education scholarship.
Ruth is a junior at Teachers College, Henderson State University, majoring in early childhood education. In her class with Dr. Lonnie McDonald, her assignment was to write a children’s book. McDonald submitted the students’ work to the Studentreasures National Book Challenge, a contest that awards the winning author with a scholarship for $250. In the 13 years that McDonald has been teaching the course at Henderson, Ruth is the first student whose work is being considered for the prize.
The Studentreasures program is provided by Nationwide Learning Resources Inc. of Topeka, Kansas, according to McDonald. It is an effort to get students from kindergarten through college to write.
“In my Methods of Language Arts class, it provides the students their first real opportunity to write something original and get it placed in a published book format,” McDonald said. “The company does not purchase copyright privileges; therefore, the student’s work is not on the shelf for purchase. However, it is a published work and gives the writer a sense of being an authentic author.”
A Title I aide at Lockesburg schools before attending Henderson, Ruth had obtained an associate of arts degree at a community college and decided to enter Teachers College, Henderson to earn a degree in P-4 Early Childhood Education. She has been married for 25 years and has a 15-year-old son.
“It was hard at first,” she said of returning to school, “but my family has been very supportive.”
Her husband, in fact, helped her find her “voice” for The Story of Shadow, A Special Dog. She knew she wanted to tell the story of how her family had gotten Shadow, a Golden Retriever, but she was having difficulty putting the story together. Her husband suggested that she let Shadow tell the story in first person. When she personified the dog, she said, “it just flowed after that.”
The reader learns how the Ruth family chose Shadow from his littermates and how the puppy felt when he was first taken from the only home he had known. Ruth takes the reader through Shadow’s becoming a member of the family and how he enjoyed going to “work” with his Dad (Ruth’s husband) in his logging operation.
Ruth and her sister did all the illustrations for the book in bright colors sure to appeal to youngsters.
Now that her book has been selected for competition in Studentreasures, it’s a wait until May to see if she’s won the scholarship.