FictionAlley Announces Scholarship Winners

[Heidi]

When teenage writer Katie O'Brien lost her battle with leukemia in the
spring of 2005, FAWC, the non-profit educational arm of
FictionAlley.org and its family of websites, created three
scholarships for young writers in her memory.

The winners of the 2006-2007 Katie O'Brien Memorial scholarship are:

*Ashley Yutzy, of the Maryland Institute College of Art
*Michelle A., who will be attending Florida State University this fall
*Rachel W. of Colorado's Naropa University

The program was open this year to individuals who would be full-time
students in the 2006-2007 school year; almost one hundred applications
were submitted, and three awards of five hundred dollars - one for
art, one for creative writing and one for community service - have
been awarded.

Heidi Tandy, president of FictionAlley, commended the three winners,
and said, "These young women have shown passion, talent and
originality, and that is truly the magic of creativity. Perhaps
someday, they will be, like J.K. Rowling, able to share their creative
magic with the world."

Examples of works created by the three winners will be on display in
FictionAlley's booth at Lumos, the Harry Potter conference taking
place in Las Vegas July 27 - 30, 2006.  In addition, FictionAlley is
hosting art from Ms Yutzy's portfolio at
http://www.fictionalley.org/scholarship/art.html; a selection from
Michelle's winning submission for the Community Service scholarship is
at http://www.fictionalley.org/scholarship/communityservice.html and a
selection from Rachel's winning submission for the Writing scholarship
is at http://www.fictionalley.org/scholarship/writing.html.

Beginning in 2005, thousands of people around the world purchased
CREATIVITY & MAGIC wristbands, and FictionAlley used the proceeds to
fund scholarships.  There are plans to continue awarding the
scholarships through the 2008-1009 school year.   Wristbands are still
available via http://www.fictionalley.org/wristbands.html, and will be
on sale at Lumos, as will two surprises for our 2006 scholarship
fundraiser.

FictionAlley celebrates its fifth anniversary this summer as the host
of the largest collection of Harry Potter fanfiction, fanart and
fan-discussion. The site has provided a place for thousands of writers
and artists to share their stories and their art, get feedback on
their work from other fans, and improve in their craft.

ABOUT FICTIONALLEY: FictionAlley.org was founded in the summer of 2001
by a dozen Harry Potter fans - mostly fanfic writers and artists - as
an archive for Harry Potter fanfic; the site hosts any story with
reasonably good grammar and spelling as long as it does not merit an
adults-only rating. Since 2001, the site has grown to include over ten
thousand stories and chapters by thousands of writers, as well as
thousands of fan-generated artworks, hundreds of fan-films, and now, a
beta project of audio recordings of fanfiction, and has been a
frequent sponsor of events for Harry Potter fans, including Nimbus -
2003, The Witching Hour, Accio and movie- and book-release parties in
dozens of cities from Melbourne, Australia to Los Angeles, California.

FAWC also hosts HarryPotterWiki.com, a Wiki about J.K. Rowling, the
Harry Potter series and its fandom, and HPInkPot.com, a collection of
essays about the series, writing and creativity. In May, 2006,
FictionAlley launched Spell-Cast.com, a biweekly podcast by, for and
about fans and the things they make, do, create, learn and discuss.
FictionAlley has been featured on the front page of the Sunday New
York Times, by the BBC, in the Miami Herald, National Public Radio,
the Sacramento Bee and BOOK magazine. In April, 2004, FictionAlley was
nominated for a WEBBY Award. In the spring of 2005, FictionAlley was
nominated for a Prix Ars Electronica award; the Prix Ars is considered
the Nobel Prize of web awards. In the summer of 2005, FictionAlley
was invited to be part of the MINERVA project at the Library of
Congress; the Library now archives all of the contents of FictionAlley
for its permanent collection.